ii shares isa and trading account confusion - help please

MBdriver

I recently opened a shares ISA on-line with Interactive Investor. I don't recall the exact procedure I followed, but anyway I transferred in my full £20K allowance. I now find I have an account called "ISA" and another called "Trading Account". The ISA account is showing a balance of zero, and remaining ISA allowance of zero. The Trading account is showing the £20K plus a bit of growth since the account was opened. When I phoned ii to query what the situation was, they said

1. all the money from the ISA account had been transferred to the Trading Account during the "opening the account" process. 

2. The ISA is not flexible so no money can be transferred into it either from outside or from the Trading Account.

3. The Trading Account is not an ISA and so any gains in it will be subject to CGT.

I am very confused by this. I intended to get a tax-free shares ISA and it seems I've ended up with a bog-standard taxable investment account that I did not want and lost my year's ISA allowance in the process.

Is the information from Interactive Investor correct? (the lady on the phone had to keep calling some other department to get answers to my questions)

Is there anything I can do about it to get my ISA allowance back?

Thanks for any advice, much appreciated.

Hoenir

MBdriver said:

 I don't recall the exact procedure I followed,

Everything would have been confirmed in writing. Have you gone back and reread the correspondence. 

jimjames

MBdriver said:

IIs there anything I can do about it to get my ISA allowance back?

If it's within 14 days of opening can you cancel and get it refunded?

dunstonh

1. all the money from the ISA account had been transferred to the Trading Account during the "opening the account" process. 

2. The ISA is not flexible so no money can be transferred into it either from outside or from the Trading Account.

3. The Trading Account is not an ISA and so any gains in it will be subject to CGT.

1 - its likely that when you transferred the money, you used the reference for the GIA (trading account) rather than the ISA.  However, that is not an issue as you can bed & ISA (or internal transfer) from the GIA to the ISA.
2 - That is incorrect.  
3 - correct but not an issue once you move the money into the ISA.

I am very confused by this. I intended to get a tax-free shares ISA and it seems I've ended up with a bog-standard taxable investment account that I did not want and lost my year's ISA allowance in the process.

You haven't lost your ISA allowance as you haven't used it.  If it had done into the ISA first and then withdrawn from the ISA, then you would have lost the ISA allowance.

soulsaver

I'd just transfer the GIA funds to the ISA account and see what happens to the stated allowance.

If that fails, call them again.

Ask for a supervisor if you get the impression you're dealing with a newby and not getting anywhere.

Explain that what you ended up with was not what you intended.

So, either II have screwed up or you have.  

If the time elapsed is short, II have the capability of correcting it, no matter who is at fault.

Their systems should be idiot proof in this respect, so be tenacious, don't be fobbed off.

Be prepared to submit a complaint if II won't take corrective action. 
 

wmb194

“ 1. all the money from the ISA account had been transferred to the Trading Account during the "opening the account" process. ”

This doesn’t sound possible or is it the way you’ve phrased it? What do the transactions show on both of the accounts?

MBdriver

Many thanks for all your advice. The 14 days period is long gone. I didn't receive any letters, just loads of emails which I will now plough through again and see if that sheds any light.

wmb194

MBdriver said:

Many thanks for all your advice. The 14 days period is long gone. I didn't receive any letters, just loads of emails which I will now plough through again and see if that sheds any light.

Can't you login and look at the transactions? If what you think transpired is correct you should see a deposit of £20,000 to your Isa followed by a £20,000 transfer to your GIA.

MBdriver

Thanks again to all who commented. The account definitely won't allow INTERNAL stock transfers into an ISA, only from one Trading Account to another. Generally I can't make any sense of the web site, it's far from intuitive. Although I read three documents yesterday, I cannot now locate them again. I haven't bothered looking for transactions. I can't see how to get to see any statements, but maybe that's because there haven't been any yet, it's too soon. As regards correspondence, there have only been emails. After opening the account it took THREE WEEKS to receive confirmation of a direct debit set up for payment of fees, and SEVEN WEEKS for information on how to send a secure message. Apart from this there were loads of offers to open a SIPP, Weekend Specials, refer a friend etc etc - but nothing of actually useful information. So it seems I must have opened the trading account in error, and transferred the cash into the ISA and then onto the Trading Account. And as suspected, I'm now stuck with it. I don't have time to waste trying any more to change this, I'll just live with it and be more careful next year. But I doubt I'll be in a hurry to do anything more with ii except get all of my shares out and into someone else's ISA next April. Thanks for your help.

I will say I've had experience of on-line investment accounts and shares ISAs with AJ Bell, Fidelity and Quilter. Most of these have been inherited from dead relatives. Quilter has been a nightmare and I've now severed all contact, one of the most incredibly client-hostile organisations I've ever experienced, third only to Equiniti and nPower. Bell has been OK - a bit clunky but I can manage. Fidelity has been pretty good. After reading so many good things about ii I have been left very disappointed and I certainly wouldn't recommend them.

dunstonh

The account definitely won't allow INTERNAL stock transfers into an ISA, only from one Trading Account to another.

That is correct. Nobody does, as you cannot move investments in specie between wrappers.  However, they do allow cash transfers (i.e. sell the units and rebuy in the ISA)

and transferred the cash into the ISA and then onto the Trading Account. 

Are you sure you did that?    To transfer funds into the ISA, then to key a withdrawal to the GIA and then to buy funds within the GIA is a lot of manual steps.    Are you sure you didn't just transfer the money to the GIA directly?

I will say I've had experience of on-line investment accounts and shares ISAs with AJ Bell, Fidelity and Quilter. Most of these have been inherited from dead relatives. Quilter has been a nightmare and I've now severed all contact, one of the most incredibly client-hostile organisations I've ever experienced

Quilter are normally great.   They are expensive and I rarely use them but their servicing is normally very good.

However, they are an intermediary platform and cannot and will not give you advice or an opinion.   They can only answer factual questions.  So, maybe it was your expectation and what they are able to do (or not do) that was out of sync with your expectation.     DIY platforms and intermediary platforms are set up differently.  

wmb194

MBdriver said:

Thanks again to all who commented. The account definitely won't allow INTERNAL stock transfers into an ISA, only from one Trading Account to another. Generally I can't make any sense of the web site, it's far from intuitive. Although I read three documents yesterday, I cannot now locate them again. I haven't bothered looking for transactions. I can't see how to get to see any statements, but maybe that's because there haven't been any yet, it's too soon. As regards correspondence, there have only been emails. After opening the account it took THREE WEEKS to receive confirmation of a direct debit set up for payment of fees, and SEVEN WEEKS for information on how to send a secure message. Apart from this there were loads of offers to open a SIPP, Weekend Specials, refer a friend etc etc - but nothing of actually useful information. So it seems I must have opened the trading account in error, and transferred the cash into the ISA and then onto the Trading Account. And as suspected, I'm now stuck with it. I don't have time to waste trying any more to change this, I'll just live with it and be more careful next year. But I doubt I'll be in a hurry to do anything more with ii except get all of my shares out and into someone else's ISA next April. Thanks for your help.

I will say I've had experience of on-line investment accounts and shares ISAs with AJ Bell, Fidelity and Quilter. Most of these have been inherited from dead relatives. Quilter has been a nightmare and I've now severed all contact, one of the most incredibly client-hostile organisations I've ever experienced, third only to Equiniti and nPower. Bell has been OK - a bit clunky but I can manage. Fidelity has been pretty good. After reading so many good things about ii I have been left very disappointed and I certainly wouldn't recommend them.

You should be able to clear this up pretty quickly if you look at the transactions. ii's help page says that you can find your transaction history in the portfolio menu.

https://www.ii.co.uk/help/using-your-account