The Financial Ombudsman Service has upheld a complaint against The On-Line Partnership Limited after it found a transfer to a self-invested personal pension was not “appropriate and suitable in the circumstances”.
The complainant, Mrs L, alleged her pension plan was transferred into a Sipp without her authority and that the transferred funds were held in cash.
She added this incurred a financial loss for her and said she should be compensated.
The complaint
Explaining the situation, Mrs L stated that she became a client of Advizertech Ltd, an appointed representative of The On-Line Partnership Limited, in 2016.
Advizertech helped her set up a personal pension and an individual savings account which was held on a third party platform.
Then, in 2018, Mrs L was advised to stop making contributions into the personal pensions as she was in danger of breaching the lifetime pension contribution limit.
In February 2023, Mrs L’s financial adviser passed away and she subsequently obtained the login details for the platform where she believed her Isa was held.
However, when she accessed her account on the platform, she discovered that, as well as an Isa, she also had a Sipp, which she was unaware of, where the funds were held in cash.
Mrs L then contacted On-Line Partnership to discuss this and ascertain what had happened.
She told by the partnership that her late adviser had transferred her personal pension to the Sipp on August 6 2020.
Following this, Mrs L complained to On-Line Partnership about the transfer on March 10 2023, stating that she was unaware of the transfer and had not given permission for it.
Additionally, she said the funds transferred into the Sipp had fallen in value owing to the adviser changes eroding the capital value which had been held in cash.
She estimated that, if her pension funds had been left in the previous pension and not transferred, they would have grown by around £20,000.
On-Line Partnership issued a response on April 13 2023, upholding the part of Mrs L’s complaint relating to the funds being held in cash and said the funds should have instead have been invested in the HSBC Global Strategy Balanced Portfolio.
However, it did not uphold her complaint about the pension transfer itself, confirming that Mrs L did authorise the pension switch and had copies of a suitability report her adviser had prepared for her date August 3 and a Sipp application from August 5, signed by Mrs L.
On-Line Partnership also contended the transfer was made to meet her financial objectives, which were outlined in the suitability report.
It concluded that it should refund the ongoing adviser advice charges and compensate Mrs L for the lack of growth while her funds were held in cash and not invested as they were intended to be.
It calculated that this should be around £13,300 and offered Mrs L this amount to settle on a full and final settlement basis.
