All Joking Apart

Re: Who’s money is it?

I write regarding the coverage of the unequal struggle between the Policyholder Advocate and those who appointed her as recommended by the Financial Services Authority. Firstly it is certain that policyholders would question the independence of an arbiter which is appointed by the company who wish to pay out less money than was promised in policy documents and promotional literature. I myself was sceptical at first but over the many months that have been wasted due to the intransigence of the company actuaries and executives I have warmed to the team who really do have the interests of the policyholders at heart. I have been in the financial services industry almost 23 years and can vouch for the fact that the company is only disclosing part of the information to the press and this is likely to confuse and mislead policyholders who may accept far less than they are morally, and legally, entitled to. From a regulatory perspective this is hardly ‘Treating Customers Fairly’. I would suggest that the company should correct all misleading information which has been made public and clear up the mess which is of their own making. The bullying of Clare Spottiswoode could be construed as poor corporate governance and will impact upon the reputation of what was once a variety of reputable companies who were merged into the megalith we see today. Is it any wonder that the life offices and with profits in particular are now completely discredited? Further confusion is being created by a recently invented word for all this, reattribution, it appears to be a new word for a legal form of mugging. Yet more confusion was created by Hector Sants when he told the Treasury Select Committee that it was reasonable to use the money for new business expenses, I would argue that the regulator is also being hoodwinked because the new business pays for itself by way of reduced surrender values and ongoing charges so if the company also takes money out of the fund for new business acquisition it is in effect imposing two levels of charges, contrary to what the company may think this isn’t a slush fund for intercontinental buying sprees. Furthermore it is completely unacceptable for compensation to be paid from the with-profit fund simply because the policyholders didn’t do any mis-selling and to add insult to injury they have already paid for the new business which was deemed to be wrongly sold. In any event there would be no need for any compensation if they had paid out what was actually due or had not used fictitious charges to set premiums between April 1987 and January 1995. Then there is the Needler case, which they could have won on appeal had the Board not decided against sound legal advice, this cost the policyholders many £millions.   Come on now, let’s get this over with and ensure that the owners of those policies which have matured or surrendered are included in the distribution of what was rightly theirs in the first place. From my point of view it would be good if the company could make amends for their acts or omissions with regard to the compensation paid out by IFAs for the shortfalls created by the companies to whom they entrusted their hard won goodwill and their clients’ hard earned money. Evan OwenThe IFA Defence Union

What if it got it all wrong? In any event would you let an organisation which has had at least two CCJs against it, and a ZERO credit rating from Creditsafe, take the money?

Anyone in the UK might be well advised to consider an offshore account in a more sensible regulatory jurisdiction because this one is a madhouse!

…to regulate banks - They need better people first!! They already have 740 people who were tranferred from the Bank of England, they missed Northern Rock!! The FSA failed to stop the Equitable Life disaster too! The FSA has been around since 1985, it was called the SIB in those days , it failed to stop pensions ’mis-selling’, mortgage endowment ‘mis-selling’, FSAVC ‘mis-selling’, the Split Cap problem… it couldn’t catch a a pig in a poke. 

“Most regulators’ careers end prematurely in failure and disgrace.” - HOWARD DAVIES : HENRY THORNTON LECTURE : CITY UNIVERSITY BUSINESS SCHOOL : 4 NOVEMBER 1998

“Idealism increases in direct proportion to one’s distance from the problem” - John Galsworthy

“It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.” - Thomas Sowell

“From the beginning of our history the country has been afflicted with compromise. It is by compromise that human rights have been abandoned.”
- Compromise Quotes

“If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law.” - Winston Churchill

“The wisdom of the wise and the experience of the ages, may be preserved through quotations.” - Benjamin Disraeli

Don’t panic Capain Mannering, don’t panic.

The banks won’t lend each other money - PANIC

The banks refuse to lend to Northern Rock - PANIC

Northern Rock - Can’t borrow money to repay its loans, nobody wants to buy it (can’t blame them!), these things happen!!

As the song goes “How long has this been goin’ on?” Some say six weeks, others say six years.

As the saying goes: “There are three types of people, those who make it happen, those who watch it happen and those who wonder what happened”

So, a very young banker made it happen, a very stupid regulator watched it happen and the government wonders what happened. 

Regulation is not fit for purpose, it is a DEAD PARROT!

Well I’ve had a first skim read and can only say that if you thought you were paranoid I can now confirm that you are in fact perfectly sane they are out to get you .I have never read such an appalling piece of biased and illogical work.Please look at appendix 4 which list the members of the committees that produced this tosh and decide why they did this knife act on the IFA channel.

Do we need 2,000 UK regulators to rubber stamp EU law?

Beware the male bovine excrement emanating from the Financial Services Authority, the rulebook must be scrapped before 1st November 2007 so the FSA is running around spouting off about ‘Principles’ so that they can keep their >2,000 jobs and the FOS can continue to make determinations that are pure unadulterated retrospective regulation.

The Irish regulator scrapped its rulebook in August 2006, why is the FSA faffing about?

Everyone is entitled to legal certainty, the FSA thinks it is above the law.

We will be posting examples of incompetence, bias and sheer stupidity here.

The Leviathan laid bare