THE SITUATION
Mr J.Edwards from Derbyshire served in the Armed Forces from 2006 to 2012. In March 2015, he acted on advice from Cowley & Miller (IFA) to transfer his Armed Forces Pension Scheme (AFPS) into a Personal Pension arrangement with Scottish Life (a Division of Royal London). The Service Personnel & Veterans Agency confirmed that the amount transferred was £17,048.09.
By January 2024 (9 years on), his Scottish Life/Royal London fund had grown to a value of £21,808.28. As the funds had grown in value, Mr Edwards. saw no reason to question the advice he had been given concerning the pension transfer.
However, after speaking to a Friend (and ex-colleague), who Money and Me Solicitors (MMS) previously assisted in claiming over £16,000 compensation, he made his initial enquiry with us. Mr Edwards engaged with our services in April 2023 for further investigation and content with our terms and proven track record.
OUR APPROACH
After conducting a 4-month in-depth investigation, we believed that Cowley & Miller wrongly advised Mr Edwards to transfer his AFPS. We established that Cowley & Miller had gone out of business in 2022 and, therefore submitted the claim to the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) in August 2023.
Further into the process we established that the equivalent ‘hypothetical value’ of his AFPS would have been £84,961.27 and in total, it was calculated that he had suffered an actual loss of £63,279.56.
THE OUTCOME
On 10th January 2024, we were delighted to inform Mr Edwards that we had secured a successful outcome, resulting in the FSCS awarding him compensation of £63,279.56. This amount ‘put him back’ to the financial position he would have been in, had he not acted on the unsuitable pension transfer advice from Cowley & Miller.
Mr Edwards was absolutely delighted with the outcome and thanked us not only for winning his claim but also for how we dealt with him throughout the process.
In his own words, Mr Edwards. stated about MMS, “brilliant service with minimal effort from my side” – Mr J.Edwards.
