Interactive Investor

[cliffords]

Probably a thread for the new year , but I will start it now .

I have made my mind up to move my SIPP to something like interactive investor in the new year .
I will be leaving the costs of a financial advisor behind and the associated platform costs .

I appreciate II has some costs to . My question, is there some experience on here of II that people are willing to share and any tips .
I would most likely chose one of there ready made pots such as the Vanguard one . I am in year two of drawdown.

Seeking any experience or tips of II please , and of course any alternatives known to be better

Thank you

[MattsCar]

I don't have a pension with them, but have been using them for a number of years.

Customer service is excellent, phone picked up pretty much instantly every time I call and always someone knowledgeable to speak to on the other end who can answer any questions you have.

[PoorCarCollector]

Very happy long term ii customer here
Have had my SIPP / ISA / GIA with them for many years

As above, customer service I have found is excellent, as is their client portal. No negatives I have yet found.

[Craikeybaby]

I moved various pensions into a SIPP with them, I have been impressed with the service so far.

[deggles]

Also an Interactive Investor user here (ISA, SIPP and trading account).

Costs are very reasonable - especially if you have a large pot the flat-fee model makes a lot of sense. I think I pay £21.99/month for everything.

Generally good service and the app and website are improving all the time. Only minor gripe is their FX fees seem a bit steep, but that's not an issue unless you're regularly trading overseas shares.

[bitchstewie]

What are you invested in right now?

[GiantEnemyCrab]

I use for GIA.

They can't generate a CGT cert as they are an execution only platform according to their support, so something to consider if you are drip feeding over a year / sell once a year to bed and ISA....

[PoorCarCollector]

GiantEnemyCrab said:

I use for GIA.

They can't generate a CGT cert as they are an execution only platform according to their support, so something to consider if you are drip feeding over a year / sell once a year to bed and ISA....

They issue a yearly Consolidated Tax Certificate, which I then to give to my accountant together with a basic p/l spreadsheet to calculate CGT, that seems pretty straight forward

[Babber101]

Try looking at AJ Bell to compare. Very good customer service, good range of investments and low cost

[V12GT]

Moved a SIPP from HL to ii about 2 years ago. Their fees are about 80% less, and due to their cashback offer, I’ve effectively got 2 years’ fees free.

Happy with the transfer service and although I haven’t had to deal with them since, the online trading works well.

[chip*]

ii has met my expectations.
Fairly friendly app and website to navigate and transact. Good audit trail of pending and completed trades with trade settlement as expected. Prompt customer service dealing with a recent unusual query of mine. Comforting to know I can pick up the phone and speak to someone who has some level of technical knowledge! The only issue I encountered was when the system refused to register my new debit card. It wasn't urgent, so I fired off a secured message and a response within 24 hours explaining the cause and resolution (card company set London address just with London so no need to input the local area such as Wandsworth, Ealing etc..). Many make financial decision based solely on the "cheapest" headline numbers (I name this the RyanAir decision ), but I don't mind paying £12.99 a month for a service with a decent customer support and backed by a fairly large and stable company (Having worked in the Credit sector for a chunk of my career, I prefer to avoid small companies due to the operational risk and uncertainty with financial stability).

[cliffords]

Babber101 said:

Try looking at AJ Bell to compare. Very good customer service, good range of investments and low cost

Thanks for the replies so far . I had looked at AJ Bell , however they are at 0.6% fee before transaction costs . That's of the SIPP size as a whole .
Its a fairly healthy pot and that represents a fair slug . Most of my motivation is trying to move away from % fees on my pot .
Appreciate the suggestion though .

[cliffords]

bhstewie said:

What are you invested in right now?

Currently in an Aviva wrapper.
Quite a bit of USA, tech etc, Near 60% equities and 40%other , tiny bit of this is cash . The performance as far as growth is concerned is good. However its just market movements . I am actually as interested in Yield . I don't have any complaints over the platform or the investment choice right now . Its purely the IFA charges that I just don't need any more . I am two years into drawdown , 30 years in Banking before I retired .
FA is a nice fellow but I am paying for him to play golf and I am going to stop that in early 2025.

[bitchstewie]

cliffords said:

Currently in an Aviva wrapper.
Quite a bit of USA, tech etc, Near 60% equities and 40%other , tiny bit of this is cash . The performance as far as growth is concerned is good. However its just market movements . I am actually as interested in Yield . I don't have any complaints over the platform or the investment choice right now . Its purely the IFA charges that I just don't need any more . I am two years into drawdown , 30 years in Banking before I retired .
FA is a nice fellow but I am paying for him to play golf and I am going to stop that in early 2025.

Can you list the actual funds?

If those are all active funds I suspect you'll struggle to get close to that using Vanguard multi-asset or target-retirement funds and USA and tech tends not to be focused on yield it's usually all about growth and total return.

Keep in mind if they're active funds they are probably costing a fair bit more than low cost Vanguard fund too so depending what your current total costs are you may find there's a double saving.