Hargreaves Lansdown in trouble?

Albermarle

charlie12525 said:

I transferred my SIPP from HL to CMC Invest a year or so ago taking advantage of a cashback offer from CMC.

CMC Invest are vastly inferior with their poor service.

If I see a good cashback offer from HL I will transfer back as they were OK.

I think that puts the issue in perspective.
HL service is still better than some others, but their standards seem to have slipped and this is particularly an issue as they are expensive.
I have used HL, AJ Bell and Fidelity and they have all been pretty good.

Purple_Jumper

I too have found that HL Customer Service are not as knowledgeable as they used to be and often give cut and paste answers rather than answer the question you've asked.

I've also noticed that a number of fund factsheets contain out of date data but HL simply hide behind disclaimers and the fact that this information is provided by a third party, there seems to be very little checking of the accuracy of the data they display. 

mills112

Albermarle said:

charlie12525 said:

I transferred my SIPP from HL to CMC Invest a year or so ago taking advantage of a cashback offer from CMC.

CMC Invest are vastly inferior with their poor service.

If I see a good cashback offer from HL I will transfer back as they were OK.

I think that puts the issue in perspective.
HL service is still better than some others, but their standards seem to have slipped and this is particularly an issue as they are expensive.
I have used HL, AJ Bell and Fidelity and they have all been pretty good.

i haven't used AJ Bell.  I used Fidelity before I changed to HL and I found Fedelity to be pretty pathetic.  Their website is so much inferior to HL and they don't have as many products as HL.

I will have a look at AJ Bell as a few people have mentioned them.  Are they a big player like HL and Fidelity?

OP - I took another 50k out of my HL fund & share account today and the money is here already! so within the last few days, I have taken 189k out and it has all come back so they can't be in trouble!

Zekko

Albermarle said:

HL were sold to a private equity consortium in March. Maybe this is affecting their performance, staff morale etc ?

Ooof, Private Equity. Masters at buying businesses, selling or cutting all of the things that keep them alive, then achieving a profitable exit before they go into administration.

Expect the customer experience at HL to be whittled away in order to maintain their ROI.

Rich1976

I still use HL and they are still one of the better companies for customer service. Haven’t noticed any decline in quality since the takeover. 

masonic

Purple_Jumper said:

I've also noticed that a number of fund factsheets contain out of date data but HL simply hide behind disclaimers and the fact that this information is provided by a third party, there seems to be very little checking of the accuracy of the data they display. 

They are using Financial Express (who run Trustnet) for data and Broadridge for documents. Whereas others use Morningstar.

This went downhill before the private equity firm bought them up. I can remember them being the first of the major brokers to get the latest fund prices.

masonic

mills112 said:

Albermarle said:

charlie12525 said:

I transferred my SIPP from HL to CMC Invest a year or so ago taking advantage of a cashback offer from CMC.

CMC Invest are vastly inferior with their poor service.

If I see a good cashback offer from HL I will transfer back as they were OK.

I think that puts the issue in perspective.
HL service is still better than some others, but their standards seem to have slipped and this is particularly an issue as they are expensive.
I have used HL, AJ Bell and Fidelity and they have all been pretty good.

i haven't used AJ Bell.  I used Fidelity before I changed to HL and I found Fedelity to be pretty pathetic.  Their website is so much inferior to HL and they don't have as many products as HL.

I will have a look at AJ Bell as a few people have mentioned them.  Are they a big player like HL and Fidelity?

OP - I took another 50k out of my HL fund & share account today and the money is here already! so within the last few days, I have taken 189k out and it has all come back so they can't be in trouble!

AJ Bell is a FTSE 250 company. Certainly big enough to be considered a major player, but not as big as HL (and much smaller than Fidelity). Consistently cheaper. I hold my LISA with them (and on and off my SIPP), so don't want S&S ISA there too, but otherwise would. I rate their customer service - on a couple of occasions they've gone above and beyond for me.

One other thing to mention in AJ Bell's favour is that they tend to advocate for their customers, for example speaking out against negative changes to ISAs and pensions.

Another to consider is iWeb (now Scottish Widows Sharedealing), which is part of Halifax Sharedealing. Cheap and cheerful, but fine if you are ok with no-frills.

Albermarle

mills112 said:

Albermarle said:

charlie12525 said:

I transferred my SIPP from HL to CMC Invest a year or so ago taking advantage of a cashback offer from CMC.

CMC Invest are vastly inferior with their poor service.

If I see a good cashback offer from HL I will transfer back as they were OK.

I think that puts the issue in perspective.
HL service is still better than some others, but their standards seem to have slipped and this is particularly an issue as they are expensive.
I have used HL, AJ Bell and Fidelity and they have all been pretty good.

i haven't used AJ Bell.  I used Fidelity before I changed to HL and I found Fedelity to be pretty pathetic.  Their website is so much inferior to HL and they don't have as many products as HL.

I will have a look at AJ Bell as a few people have mentioned them.  Are they a big player like HL and Fidelity?

OP - I took another 50k out of my HL fund & share account today and the money is here already! so within the last few days, I have taken 189k out and it has all come back so they can't be in trouble!

There used to be negative comments about Fidelity regularly on here, but not so recently. They upgraded their website and systems significantly about 5 years ago.
I have recently taken my first and second tax free lump sum from my SIPP, and it all arrived exactly when expected.
Any queries are answered in about 24 hours.

Fidelity as a company are in different league sizewise, with assets under management in the many Trillions of Dollars.
However if you just look at UK investment platforms that cater for the public, HL are the biggest.
Fidelity and Interactive Investor are probably close seconds, and AJ Bell fourth.
One difference is their company culture/marketing communications.
HLs are very low brow/sales orientated and prone to gimmicks ( like buy this new fund now whilst it is still only £1)
AJ Bells are more aimed at the active investor, and as said they can also be quite outspoken about Govt policy. Some of the articles have a kind of Daily Mail flavour to them. 
Fidelity e mails are a bit more aimed at the middle aged/middle class/medium risk type of investor.
Just my opinions though.

Alexland

Albermarle said:

There used to be negative comments about Fidelity regularly on here, but not so recently. They upgraded their website and systems significantly about 5 years ago.
..
Fidelity e mails are a bit more aimed at the middle aged/middle class/medium risk type of investor.

Yes I've done paid research panels for Fidelity and its quite impressive the amount of thinking they do behind the scenes on how to keep the website looking simple and nudge customers towards good investment outcomes. They seem to start with a view that if their customers are successful then their success will follow.

Rather than other places that see customers as something to be milked and up-sold junk to.

AJ Bells are more aimed at the active investor

AJ Bell will be disappointed with me then as I only hold a single investment in each capped account. I think of them as the more competent, cheaper, Manchester version of HL and on the rare occasions I've had to call AJ Bell then I've always been happy with the ability of the person that answers the phone.

Albermarle

Alexland said:

Albermarle said:

There used to be negative comments about Fidelity regularly on here, but not so recently. They upgraded their website and systems significantly about 5 years ago.
..
Fidelity e mails are a bit more aimed at the middle aged/middle class/medium risk type of investor.

Yes I've done paid research panels for Fidelity and its quite impressive the amount of thinking they do behind the scenes on how to keep the website looking simple and nudge customers towards good investment outcomes. They seem to start with a view that if their customers are successful then their success will follow.

Rather than other places that see customers as something to be milked and up-sold junk to.

AJ Bells are more aimed at the active investor

AJ Bell will be disappointed with me then as I only hold a single investment in each capped account. I think of them as the more competent, cheaper, Manchester version of HL and on the rare occasions I've had to call AJ Bell then I've always been happy with the ability of the person that answers the phone.

Yes a rather old fashioned, but good way of working. Presumably comes from their roots as a family firm in the US.

I made that comment about AJ Bell, as they seem to be a bit more active/aggressive in their investment commentary. Otherwise no issue with them.