APS ISA transfer help

nsluker

Hi - when my dad passed away a few years ago my mum and I consolidated all his ISAs into a Virgin S&S APS ISA. Now, years later, we would like to transfer this ISA money to a new provider iWeb to invest / we filled in the iWeb transfer form to get things moving  - the problem is that Virgin has written stating that the new provider iWeb does not accept APS transfers. As far as I was concerned, the money was just in ISA status and the fact that a few years back we used the APS process to retain tax free status should now be irrelevant to the current attempt to transfer to a new provider. Has anyone come across this problem? Virgin has said they can’t internally transfer it to be a “normal” ISA that could be transferred to iWeb. It just seems crazy - it’s just money in an ISA, so I’m not clear how I can get it to iWeb retaining its ISA status? Virgin suggested selling the ISA and taking proceeds, but that would lose the ISA status, or alternatively finding another company (which my mum doesn’t want to do as she wants things in one place). Does anyone have any ideas please? 

badger09

nsluker said:

Hi - when my dad passed away a few years ago my mum and I consolidated all his ISAs into a Virgin S&S APS ISA. Now, years later, we would like to transfer this ISA money to a new provider iWeb to invest / we filled in the iWeb transfer form to get things moving  - the problem is that Virgin has written stating that the new provider iWeb does not accept APS transfers. As far as I was concerned, the money was just in ISA status and the fact that a few years back we used the APS process to retain tax free status should now be irrelevant to the current attempt to transfer to a new provider. Has anyone come across this problem? Virgin has said they can’t internally transfer it to be a “normal” ISA that could be transferred to iWeb. It just seems crazy - it’s just money in an ISA, so I’m not clear how I can get it to iWeb retaining its ISA status? Virgin suggested selling the ISA and taking proceeds, but that would lose the ISA status, or alternatively finding another company (which my mum doesn’t want to do as she wants things in one place). Does anyone have any ideas please? 

Can you quote exactly what the letter from Virgin says?

Basically you are correct, in that once the amount allowed as APS has been paid into your mum's ISA, it is effectively treated as her own previous years' subscriptions.

I don't know much about Virgin's S&S ISAs but from a quick glance, it looks like they offer a ready made portfolio of investments, supposedly targeted at various risk levels. IWEB will not offer exactly the same product, so mum's S&S ISA with Virgin would have to be sold to cash, then the cash transferred to IWEB through IWEB's xfer process, all still within the ISA wrapper.

Is that perhaps what Virgin said in their letter? 

nsluker

Hi - thanks for the reply - I already transferred the cash proceeds from selling some of my mum’s virgin S&S ISA products to iWeb and reinvested in different share products. Virgin say for the APS holdings (which were exactly the same Virgin products!) “we have been unable to process your request as the plan manager has stated that they are unable to accept APS transfers. If you need to do an APS transfer from us to the new plan manager then you will need to fund the ISA directly with the new plan manager. You can sell the holding with us and invest the proceeds with your new plan manager”. I spoke to Virgin and they clarified that the last sentence meant just withdrawing the cash outside of the ISA. So I don’t think that I’m doing an APS transfer - which is usually when you deal with the deceased estate and take their existing ISA holdings and move them to another provider. Now it’s been 5 years and the assets are in my mum’s name - surely they should be free to move anywhere without restrictions?

badger09

nsluker said:

Hi - thanks for the reply - I already transferred the cash proceeds from selling some of my mum’s virgin S&S ISA products to iWeb and reinvested in different share products. Virgin say for the APS holdings (which were exactly the same Virgin products!) “we have been unable to process your request as the plan manager has stated that they are unable to accept APS transfers. If you need to do an APS transfer from us to the new plan manager then you will need to fund the ISA directly with the new plan manager. You can sell the holding with us and invest the proceeds with your new plan manager”. I spoke to Virgin and they clarified that the last sentence meant just withdrawing the cash outside of the ISA. So I don’t think that I’m doing an APS transfer - which is usually when you deal with the deceased estate and take their existing ISA holdings and move them to another provider. Now it’s been 5 years and the assets are in my mum’s name - surely they should be free to move anywhere without restrictions?

Obviously you don't want to lose the ISA status so that's a non starter. 
I'm still puzzled why Virgin are talking about APS holdings, as if they're somehow a separate entity to mum's other S&S holdings.
And who is the Plan Manager they refer to? It sounds like a term which might describe their own 'investment approaches'


This is the S&S ISA transfer history form which Virgin should complete & send with the transfer. Nowhere does it ask for details of any APS 
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/376169/stocks-shares.pdf

I think you need to escalate this within Virgin