Comments on: A not very Equitable Life

By: Jon

Jon — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 18:44:00 +0000

I don’t think its 5 billion but the pensions misselling scandal cost 5 to 6 billion in compensation. I don’t recall any previous government that took an issue to the 9th report on the matter, against all court in the land and ombudsman and still refuses. Thats not something I recall happening before.

By: Paul

Paul — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 20:49:18 +0000

I find it hard to believe that if you were in Government you would be willing to stump up £5 billion, John. Stop jumping on the bandwagon and pretending the Tories would have sorted it out. The Ombudsman’s report recognised it was successive governments who contributed to this mess remember

Reply: I inherited the mess of Barlow Clowes as Minister and did compensate victims.

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 19:54:00 +0000

For your information : ) The directors of all teh other leading Life Offices of the day whistle blew on Equitable life for 6 consecutive years to the FSA. They knew. They also got wind of the investigation in 2007 (I think it was) that being the 8th or 9th report, was going to go to the FSA’s office. (Further allegation about FSA ed)

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 19:48:30 +0000

And I might just add here this. The Tory’s, rightly at the time came in for huge criticism of the pensions transfers misselling at the end of the 80s. Those people were all compensated, as it turns out since are generally much better off than had the not transferred as a result as well. Also, in comparison to this gov, a small drop in the ocean. This gov just will not do the right thing no matter what judge, jury, report writer or ombudsman says.

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 19:44:17 +0000

Thank you for tabeling the questions Mr Redwood and no I don’t have any money invested there. I am just disgusted at this debacle, 9 reports is it? It’s been criminal throughout and they hide behind a public that is perhaps ignorant of how much the regulator failed here, in fact deliberately negligent. This is one of those areas, like sufficient equipment for our troops, that is beyond words like disgrace and criminal because their deliberate inaction repeated again and again.

Again, thanks for not letting it dissapear like the gov wants it to.

By: Lola

Lola — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 18:56:33 +0000

I don’t think the Ombudsman knows more than me. That’s is not to say that they have had access to a whole load more stuff than I have. What I am arguing about is the whole ‘it’s someone else’s fault and I want my compo’ culture that has grown up as a result of reg-you-lay-shun. It’s analagous to state funded unemployment benefi. All it creates is unemployment. In the same way ‘consumer protection’ creates consumers who need protecting. It’s not the knowledge it’s the philosophy.

In re long term savings, I agree that it is impossible to know who is going to do it for you, so diversify. And steer well clear of WP funds. From 1980′s onwards all this was clear. And if you wanted profesional non-spiv help you could have asked an actuary.

By: Lola

Lola — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 18:51:00 +0000

Job interview. They approached me and I was curious. I was never anywhere near taking it tho’! Call it market research. It also completely confirmed my theory that they were a direct sales outfit driven as much by ‘commisssion hungry salesmen’ as anyone else.

By: alan jutson

alan jutson — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 11:22:35 +0000

Agree with you in part about the Regulation system being in some cases flawed, but you do have to have some safeguards in life, otherwise we end up with a mafia culture where innocent people are just ripped off and taken advantage of.

What we need is good, simple Regulation.

Yes I am full aware of commission earnings, as I spent a good part of my life running a large salesforce on a commission only basis. Unfortunately some salesmen can get carried away in their quest to get that sale, and as such are sometimes economic with the truth.

Whilst I accept your premise that you should not have all of your eggs in one basket, most people have a pension provider for many years, and have (if they can afford it) other means of savings outside of a pension to help mitigate the risks.

A huge amount of publicity was given by successive Governments of all colours on the benefits of people having a personal pension, I think with hindsight pensions now are a poor form of saving for your old age, as they are so inflexible.

With regard to taking money out of a pension. The law says you cannot, once you have purchased an annuity, it is fixed until you die, and 30,000 policy holderrs have so far waiting.

Given that Equitable still has many thousands of members, further delay will result in more passing away with no recourse to compensation.

You say there has been no maladministration, but the Ombudsman who spent 4 years investigating the situation says different, and with the greatest of respect, I think they have a little more detailed information to hand than you do.

The recomendation made by the Ombudsman to the Government. Policy holders should be compensated without delay.

Congratulations on being a Qualified Engineer, there are fewer of us about now than there were many years ago.

By: alan jutson

alan jutson — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 11:00:32 +0000

Lola
Not a question of paying, it was a question of who you belived at the time.

We took advice from a number of people, some so called independent agents, some so call tied agents.

To be perfectly honest, most looked, and acted like spivs.

Was not aware of your existance in the 1980′s.
Was not aware of Equitables problems until the —- hit the fan, indeed neither were their Auditors or the FSA, and these are supposed to be proffessional people/organisations who are paid Millions to be effective and who studied the accounts and the way the Company worked for a 10 year period.

One has to ask, If they were such a bad company why did you bother to have an interview for a job with them.

By: Lola

Lola — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 20:33:39 +0000

Just to extend my reply – mrs Lola interupted me – I completely understand how you feel, but your analysis is flawed. The FSA/Government did not in any sense maladminister the regulatory system. The philosophy behind the system is flawed. Regulation, as in a guarantee by government is just not ever going to be any good, because it cannot ever work. The only way it can work is if the whole of the country is nationalised and is run on bureaucratic lines. Of course it is well understood now, by the example of the USSR/GDR etc that such a command economy does not work either. Simply trying to ‘regulate’ and ‘guarantee’ as New Labour has done absolutely guarantees that the whole thing will go wrong. No error is involved at all, it just doesn’t and will not work.

And you were told, or at least all the information was available to you, to get out of your EL investments, but you failed to do it. Why should I pay for you idleness or ignorance? I and many others were selling this advice for some time. In any event staying with one investment manager for 30 years is an absolutely bonkers risk. This is not specialised knowledge at all, but simple good investment discipline.

The fact is that most EL savers I met were very smug indeed and would never ever consider that their decisions could be flawed, just because EL said (untruthfully) that it did not pay commissions. We are all on ‘commission’ in one way or another so that’s just stupid.

In re specialised knowledge I could buy your servcices to survey a house. Why shouldn’t you buy my services to judge EL? There is absolutely no difference between those two positions.

So, in summary, there was no maladministration. And two, you and the rest of you could have easily found out about EL had you bothered. Also three if you make an investment on your own account do some work to make sure that you know what you are doing.

This is why we need to scrap whole swathes of consumer protection and all the rest of it. People no longer take any responsibility for their own mistakes. Plus it creates epic moral hazard in organisations like EL.

I still see no reason at all to pay you a penny.