Tayside Pension Fund
Amount won: £85,000
Employer/Fund: Tayside Pension Fund
FA Firm: The Mortgage Finance Store and Capital & Income Solutions
Introduction:
Our client contacted us after seeing one of our posts on Facebook to pursue a claim for a mis-sold pension.
She was advised by Mike Connelly of The Mortgage Finance Store and Capital & Income Solutions to transfer her Tayside Pension Fund pension into a personal pension with Royal London.
The Background:
Our client was 63 years old at the time and had worked for the local council for 26 years. She had a defined benefit company pension with a value of £225839.43.
She had decided to retire early and had been referred to Mike Connelly of The Mortgage Finance Store by a number of colleagues to whom he had previously given pension transfer advice.
Mike Connelly told our client that by transferring her pension she could take a bigger lump sum and this would allow her to repay her mortgage, do some home improvements and the remainder would be enough to see her through until she received her state pension. He said it would also give her flexibility to draw more money prior to that time should she need to.
Our client was financially inexperienced and relied entirely on the advice Mike Connelly gave her. He lead her to believe he was suitably qualified and authorised to give pension transfer advice and was acting in her best interests.
The Consequences:
Our client gave up valuable guaranteed benefits by transferring her Tayside Pension Fund pension.
She paid an initial fee of 5% and was told this would cover further annual reviews but these never materialised.
As stated, our client was financially inexperienced and had no pension knowledge. By transferring her pensions this gave her full access to them and she naively withdrew all the funds, suffering extensive tax charges on these withdrawals and ultimately leaving no pension funds for retirement.
Our client paid the following fees:
- Adviser fees of circa £11290 to transfer the pension.
Mike Connelly was not authorised or regulated to give pension transfer advice. He was using a regulated firm called Capital & Income Solutions to sign off the pension transfer but our client never spoke to a representative from that firm.
Capital & Income Solutions are now in liquidation.
The Settlement:
We obtained our clients files from her previous and existing pension providers and from these we were able to determine that she had a claim. We then submitted a detailed claim to the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) with considerable evidence.
The claim was submitted to the FSCS as Capital & Income Solutions, the regulated firm involved, are now in liquidation.
The FSCS calculated our client’s losses at £116,656.26 but since they have a limit to what they can pay out our client received the maximum compensation of £85,000.
This tax-free compensation was paid directly into our client’s bank account and she has since enjoyed many holidays abroad.
Have you or someone you know worked for a local Council and transferred their final salary pension?
So even if you think you were given sound advice to transfer your workplace pension, how do you know? That’s why we make it simple. Call our team on 01382 200474 or complete our on-line enquiry form and we’ll be in touch a soon as possible AND remember, that between Beat the Banks and our trusted partners, do all the hard work on your behalf, PLUS claiming has absolutely no effect on your current pension arrangements.
