Are L&G being a bit extreme?!

captain_jep

Albermarle said:

squirrelpie said:

You could always tell them something they find acceptable, and then later change your mind.

I was going to suggest telling them you had changed your mind, and were now planning on investing in Vanguard Life Strategy 60 . You could not get more mainstream than that.

Haha you’ve read my mind. I’ve gone back to them to find out whether Lifestrategy funds or HL branded funds are acceptable! Will see what they say..

dunstonh

Albermarle said:

squirrelpie said:

You could always tell them something they find acceptable, and then later change your mind.

I was going to suggest telling them you had changed your mind, and were now planning on investing in Vanguard Life Strategy 60 . You could not get more mainstream than that.

going back to say you will change the investments to something else should not make any difference.  





SIPPs, by their very nature, would trigger amber flag 6 and possibly amber flag 3.
You would expect HL to be on the clean list with most providers but HL periodically run incentives and those incentives fall foul of red flag 5.  That could knock a provider off the clean list.

Amber flags need the scheme to carry out further due diligence. While these would be disregarded with clean list providers, they would invoke further due diligence with providers not on the clean list.    And the most common method is a phone call.

A sudden change of answer to try and get the scheme transferred can actually invoke a further flag and force the next stage which is a moneyhelper meeting.  Scammers are known to try and coach people to get them through and scheme need to consider changes of answer.

Amber flag 6 cannot be overruled by changing to an OEIC as the scheme still offers the overseas investment.

artyboy

dunstonh said:

Albermarle said:

squirrelpie said:

You could always tell them something they find acceptable, and then later change your mind.

I was going to suggest telling them you had changed your mind, and were now planning on investing in Vanguard Life Strategy 60 . You could not get more mainstream than that.

going back to say you will change the investments to something else should not make any difference.  





SIPPs, by their very nature, would trigger amber flag 6 and possibly amber flag 3.
You would expect HL to be on the clean list with most providers but HL periodically run incentives and those incentives fall foul of red flag 5.  That could knock a provider off the clean list.

Amber flags need the scheme to carry out further due diligence. While these would be disregarded with clean list providers, they would invoke further due diligence with providers not on the clean list.    And the most common method is a phone call.

A sudden change of answer to try and get the scheme transferred can actually invoke a further flag and force the next stage which is a moneyhelper meeting.  Scammers are known to try and coach people to get them through and scheme need to consider changes of answer.

Amber flag 6 cannot be overruled by changing to an OEIC as the scheme still offers the overseas investment.

Thats a useful reminder of the flags, thank you Dunstonh, and a reminder for me to never let on that I'm getting cashback when I move. The idea that an in-specie transfer between 2 mainstream regulated SIPP providers could trigger a red flag on the basis of a cashback promotion is, frankly, nonsense. 

I get the sentiment behind the 'flag', but it's the rigid implementation by certain pension administrators that makes this a@se covering rather than good risk management.

Out of curiosity, is there a definitive (or even a suggested) list of what is a 'high risk' investment for the purposes of Amber flag 3? It would be rather ironic if a single UK FTSE stock (or even a UK index fund) might not be considered high risk, when a globally diversified tracker would be!

artyboy

[Deleted User] said:

artyboy said:

dunstonh said:

Albermarle said:

squirrelpie said:

You could always tell them something they find acceptable, and then later change your mind.

I was going to suggest telling them you had changed your mind, and were now planning on investing in Vanguard Life Strategy 60 . You could not get more mainstream than that.

going back to say you will change the investments to something else should not make any difference.  





SIPPs, by their very nature, would trigger amber flag 6 and possibly amber flag 3.
You would expect HL to be on the clean list with most providers but HL periodically run incentives and those incentives fall foul of red flag 5.  That could knock a provider off the clean list.

Amber flags need the scheme to carry out further due diligence. While these would be disregarded with clean list providers, they would invoke further due diligence with providers not on the clean list.    And the most common method is a phone call.

A sudden change of answer to try and get the scheme transferred can actually invoke a further flag and force the next stage which is a moneyhelper meeting.  Scammers are known to try and coach people to get them through and scheme need to consider changes of answer.

Amber flag 6 cannot be overruled by changing to an OEIC as the scheme still offers the overseas investment.

The idea that an in-specie transfer between 2 mainstream regulated SIPP providers could trigger a red flag on the basis of a cashback promotion is, frankly, nonsense. 

One person's genuine cash back might look like quite similar to another person's pension liberation scheme, with all the penalties attaching to that.  So that then places a lot of emphasis on what a 'mainstream' SIPP provider looks like.  Who decides which provider is mainstream or not?  Here is a link to an opinion on an abusive scheme that involved a pension scheme administrator https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gaar-advisory-panel-opinion-of-15-september-2022-unauthorised-payment-from-registered-pension-scheme-involving-debt-arrangement

It is not publicly known who the scheme administrator was. Would they be mainstream?

Getting cash back (in the widest sense) is high risk for both the administrator and the individual. There are recent FTT decisions that go in to a lot of detail about how these pension liberation schemes work and where the individual has lost a good chunk of their pension and the had to pay extra tax on their 'unauthorised' payment.

Saying that, it doesn't excuse incredibly poor administration around pension transfers. Vanguard, I'm looking at you ...

I find it surprising that UK FCA/PRA regulated pension firms make a habit of operating pension liberation scams...

At the risk of playing the same record again, in my own part of the financial services world, you
can place a level of reliance on another firm that is regulated in an equivalent way to you, and has certain levels of authorisation. It's not a guarantee that they will behave impeccably, but they will probably avoid out and out scams of the sort you are describing.

But hey, it's just lazier... ahem, 'easier' to apply a blanket approach rather than use a tiny bit of judgement or refinement to a rule...

Of course, when II, Charles Stanley, HL and the like all get done for liberation scams, feel free to say you told me so!

dunstonh

Those of us in the industry know the SIPP providers that the scammers typically used.    The FCA could easily find out if it wanted to, as it just needs to ask the SIPP providers for a breakdown of unregulated or illiquid assets held by them.    This is in their MI data.       

captain_jep

Well - I haven’t had a reply to my query on acceptable investments. So have decided to book the money helper consultation anyway. Set for mid June. We’ll see what happens afterwards!