Advertising watchdog to probe Natwest impartial advice claims
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Former_MSE_Natasha
Posts: 672 Forumite
This thread is to discuss the following news story:
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This was the biggest scam ever. It was never going to be impartial, just an opportunity to sell products it was very blatent, and I'm not surprised at this has become the case. And they had the cheek to tell people at they HAD to go and have one. I refused but they insisted that I should have one, Luckly I never did.0
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About time too. We have seen posts on this forum by people that have been fooled by their impartial advice. In one case someone they used the term impartial to give the impression they were an IFA.
Now if they can just get rid of those cringeworthy adverts as well.....I am an Independent Financial Adviser (IFA). The comments I make are just my opinion and are for discussion purposes only. They are not financial advice and you should not treat them as such. If you feel an area discussed may be relevant to you, then please seek advice from an Independent Financial Adviser local to you.0 -
I know it's terribly unfashionable to expect people to take responsibility for themselves, rather than accept whatever information is doled out to them then blame someone else.
But why are people surprised that a bank's advisors would push their own products? Does anyone honestly believe a bank would commit time, money and resources if they weren't going to make use of a captive audience in one of these reviews?
Yes, fine, it's advertised as "impartial advice", but what does that mean in the real world? Little more than occasionally offering competing products to pay lip service to the claim, I suspect.
It's no different to the "Fly to <insert chav-tastic destination> for only 1p" claims from low cost airlines. The claim is clearly 1p, but we all know it's going to be £50 by the time the fees, taxes, baggage charges etc are all added.
If you go into PC World with a broken computer (god help you, you've already failed the intelligence test), you don't expect them to say "oh just take it to the shop down the road, they'll give you a more appropriate service". No, you expect them to say "our in house school dropouts, with precisely 47 minutes of training, will fix your PC in no less than 4 months and for the very reasonable cost of a thousand quid".
NatWest simply deserve to get a rap on the knuckles for this, and nothing more.
If a proper IFA did it (ie: pushed a specific product, regardless of appropriateness, so they could get a special wedge of comission), that would be serious. The difference is that an IFA has the presumption of special knowledge. In other words, when someone goes to see an independent financial adviser, they expect to get impartial advice that crosses different products and options from different providers.
You've got to be a moron to believe any business, in financials or otherwise, won't push their own products.
Perhaps people should take more personal responsibility for their money. Perhaps, when they walk out of a MoneySense review, they might wonder to themselves, "hey, that was a bit odd, I only heard NatWest/RBS products mentioned in there". Perhaps they might want to go and check out the other options for themselves, because it's their money and they might want to take an interest in it. Perhaps they might take 10% of the effort they use on memorising football scores and put it towards reading up on a few financial options.
Or perhaps they want to complain and get com-pen-say-shun.Mmmm, credit crunch. Tasty.0 -
The Natwest impartial advice to a colleague was to add the last 12 months of their car payment to their mortgage which has 15 years to run.
She never did get out of them how much interest she would have paid over 15 years on the £1800 she would have borrowed.0 -
Natwest giving out advice, lol they could not run their own affairs properly, tax payer bail out!0
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I know it's terribly unfashionable to expect people to take responsibility for themselves, rather than accept whatever information is doled out to them then blame someone else.
But why are people surprised that a bank's advisors would push their own products? Does anyone honestly believe a bank would commit time, money and resources if they weren't going to make use of a captive audience in one of these reviews?
Yes, fine, it's advertised as "impartial advice", but what does that mean in the real world? Little more than occasionally offering competing products to pay lip service to the claim, I suspect.
It's no different to the "Fly to <insert chav-tastic destination> for only 1p" claims from low cost airlines. The claim is clearly 1p, but we all know it's going to be £50 by the time the fees, taxes, baggage charges etc are all added.
If you go into PC World with a broken computer (god help you, you've already failed the intelligence test), you don't expect them to say "oh just take it to the shop down the road, they'll give you a more appropriate service". No, you expect them to say "our in house school dropouts, with precisely 47 minutes of training, will fix your PC in no less than 4 months and for the very reasonable cost of a thousand quid".
NatWest simply deserve to get a rap on the knuckles for this, and nothing more.
You know, I thanked this before I fully read it. And I only just picked up the subtext - "it's OK if companies make baseless claims about the stuff they sell, because you should know better than to believe it". That's rubbish. The whole reason the ASA exists is to stop that sort of thinking even being necessary - the problem with a misleading advert isn't the person who reads it, it's the advert!
In this case, NatWest need to get hauled over the coals. It's hardly victimless - many people probably made complex and important decisions on the back of what they were told by people they had been led to believe were impartial. And the people who believed that weren't stupid or naive, they simply believed that what was advertised was true.0 -
No offence but to say that is short sighted as well. As people should be media savvey and as one of NatWest's targets I say its pretty blatent what the advice was going to be. People should realise at a bank is like a shop- it wants to sell you thingsShelfStacker wrote: »And the people who believed that weren't stupid or naive, they simply believed that what was advertised was true.0 -
the_annoyed_customer wrote:
This was the biggest scam ever.
Agreed!dunstonh wrote:
Now if they can just get rid of those cringeworthy adverts as well...
Blah99 wrote:
But why are people surprised that a bank's advisors would push their own products?
I am not in the least bit surprised. Such behaviour is exactly what I expect from NatWest, or indeed, from any of the major banks.
My major issue is that this is packaged and presented, through a national advertising campaign, and in branch, as "impartial" advice. It is an absolute joke.
I strongly disagree.
NatWest simply deserve to get a rap on the knuckles for this, and nothing more.
If the independent investigation finds that the results of the 'mystery shop' style surveys conducted by Money Marketing and Which? are representative of the quality of "impartial advice" provided by the bank, they deserve to be punished severely.
Hopefully, this will deter the other major players from playing a similar deceit. A recent survey indicated that most of the major high street players saw 'advice' as a major growth area. I think this is extremely bad news for the consumer.
And I await the results of the investigation with interest!
Different strokes for different folks. There's no need to be condescending. One of the reasons that clients pay for financial advice is that they are not then required to master the markets, or keep track of the myriad number of financial products and services available.
Perhaps they might take 10% of the effort they use on memorising football scores and put it towards reading up on a few financial options.
I'd not perform open heart surgery on myself, or my nearest and dearest - I'd trust a professional. But I think that NatWest, by their conduct, have devalued the concept of 'advice'.For the avoidance of doubt: I work for an IFA.0 -
the_annoyed_customer wrote: »No offence but to say that is short sighted as well. As people should be media savvey and as one of NatWest's targets I say its pretty blatent what the advice was going to be. People should realise at a bank is like a shop- it wants to sell you things
You miss the obvious point that the fact that people - many people, and the most vulnerable - aren't media savvy is the reason we have an ASA, and the reason why NatWest should be punished. Yes, people should read more into what they are told, but that is no excuse to actively mislead them.0 -
Heh I said this when they first advertised it0
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