Mis-sold endowments??

[Tethered Hover]

When training in Yorkshire in the late '80s, I was sold an endowment by the famous Mike S, which is now worth not very much. Has anyone out there who used him as an IFA had any success in claiming compensation?

[FFP]

I think it very much depends on whether you were given duff advice at the time. I have no experience of this(suing) but if your advisor made you aware at the time that it may not perform as it has in the past then I would guess that would scupper it.

Were you given a maturity value at the time you took it out abd has it matured at that ?

[Arkroyal]

According to Financial Mail, those who bought direct from the companies have a better chance of success than those who bought from an IFA.

[Autorev]

I was sold an endowment by the famous Mike S, which is now worth not very much

I too bought a policy from him around the same time. Assuming that yours is a 25yr policy, very few are worth much at all with 10 yrs to run - the traded endowment market has all but disappeared. However, the value of the policy when it matures is highly dependent on the policy's performance over the next 10 yrs and the terminal bonus.

I mused over whether we were all mis-sold these policies when the media frenzy latched onto the 'someone else to sue' aspect of endowments. Looking at the paperwork, his projections are a little optimistic by the standards of the markets performance over the last 3-4 yrs, but who knows what will happen over the next 10?

Also his advice was based on the fact that we were all in a fg trg system that was taking as long as 6 yrs, so us singlies were forced by the rules at the time to live in the mess. As a result, my first mortgage was taken out over 20yrs instead of 25

PS When FP floated I assume you picked up your £1K Brucie Bonus!

[Scud-U-Like]

Welcome to the PPrune Personal Finance Forum.

I'm with you, Autorev. Having examined the projections provided by my IFA, when he sold me my endowment 12 years ago, I've found they were pretty realistic. I can't complain and I wouldn't attempt to make a claim. I think many of us were attracted to endowments by MIRAS at 25%, rather than duped by crafty IFA Svengalis.

[STANDTO]

chaps

write to the endownment company

explain that you believe the policy was mis-sold

they will then investigate this at no cost to yourself, and if they find you were dealt a wrong-un, they will compensate.

Also, sue the RAF for breach of your Human Rights by denying you the right to privacy of buying your own home.

[Unmissable]

I too bought an endownment from the man with the contract at the S. Yorks training base. I found him to be honest in that he gave advice to all in the hope that a few would take out policies through him. I remember his predictions were that in 25 years the policy would be approx double the guaranteed amount. However, I never remember him promising anything. As with previous posters I believe that his best bit of advice was that if you start a policy at (say ) 23 years old, then your mortgage effectively starts then for a very low fee. Even if my policy doesn't make its predictions, then I have the satisfaction that my mortgage will be largely be reduced when I am a mere 48. I since took out further policies (most with the same company , if not IFA ) and only the first policies that MS offered are holding their ground. MS like many others resorted to selling 'low start' or 'minimum cost' policies which are no where near as good as the 'full' policies on offer in the early 80's. My ONLY complaint is that I did not realise that my later policies were not the same as the first one that I took out through MS. (Not the same by the structure of the policy rather than the performance.)




Hang on this is an aircrew forum. Where's the non-relavent button.......


I was just about to delete all that I had written on the grounds of irrelevant., but it takes me so long to type that I hate to waste hard effort.

[Ralf Wiggum]

I was under the impression that the sell by date for court action over mis-sold endowments has been and gone. This was following the outcry of the mis-selling of endowments by the media.

If I recall it correctly, the law courts ruled that if people sold endowments in the 80's/90's believed they had been mis-sold such a policy, they should take action immediately. If they did not, then they must have accepted their fate. This date was set some years after the initial outcry in order to give people plenty of time to take action. I believe the date lapsed about 3 years ago, at the time I wrote off for a forecast with my endowment company.

I am sure, however, that there may be an acception if you can prove that you were not aware of such a problem in the 90's and were unaware of the time limit on such legal action.

[ExGrunt]

For the official position see the industry regulators web site:

http://www.fsa.gov.uk/consumer/whats_new/endowments/index.html

Hope this helps.

EG

[newswatcher]

There are two critical dates involved here.

Firstly, it is unlikely that you will be able to make any claim, if your policy was taken out BEFORE April 1988, when the Financial Services Act came into force.

Secondly, you have only three years in which to take up your case for compensation, after you were first made aware that there may be a problem, usually in a "projection" letter from your assurance company.