St. James' Place - a review..

[keith2.2]

A few years ago I worked for a well known UK retailer and they were in the process of removing their final salary pension.

They employed SJP to give everyone who asked for it free financial advice on what to do.

Not entirely sure what happened but a younger and more naive me, with little in the way of savings, found myself with a medium risk Stocks and Shares ISA through them.

I opened with about 2500 (from an overdraft) and then paid in 100 per month for a couple of years, until I left to move abroad - each deposit having 5% removed for fees.

I decided to leave the money where it was and just let it grow - in line with their projections, 5,500gbp would have been 12,000gbp in around 5 years.

My disposable income is much healthier these days, and I've been investing / trading myself on the side. I was minded to review the progress of the SJP account when my dad mentioned a statement had arrived.

In 7 years, that 5,500 has turned into...

5,548.

Less than 1% return in 7 years. Not even coming close to recouping the fees.

I contacted my 'wealth' manager to say I wished to take the money out. I admit - saying how disappointed I was with the performance, particularly given the performance of my own investments.

The response came 'I think you'll find it's in line with the market trend, I have attached a 5 year chart showing 1% market growth on average'

Deeply unimpressed.

[xeny]

Sadly widely (but not widely enough) known. Particularly impressed you started the pension from your overdraft, that's some salesman.

What market do they use to show a 1% market return out of interest?

[Hitch]

To be fair, a lot of five year plans must be underwater at this point given the impact of Covid on the market. Did you really pay 5% commissions on pay in?

[dingg]

Hitch said:

To be fair, a lot of five year plans must be underwater at this point given the impact of Covid on the market. Did you really pay 5% commissions on pay in?

Are you sure?
Dow nasdaq s and p touching all time highs, it's only the FTSE that's underperformed and thats most likely brexit.

[NumBMW]

We have had too many issues with SJP to count.
They are a backward, inefficient and expensive pack who treat clients as assets on a spreadsheet.
And that’s if they even know who you are, and we had a LOT of investment with them at one point.

My advice is to get out

[chip*]

Article on SJP fund performance which is a few months old, but the message is clear:

https://www.yodelar.com/insights/st-jamess-place-r...

Got to give them credit though, they recruit a pretty efficient / persuasive sales team to bring in £108 billion AUM.

[NickCQ]

keith2.2 said:

each deposit having 5% removed for fees

Hard to make a decent return with such a headwind.

[jw673]

You're born, you take st and SJP take a percentage of your wealth.
You get out in the world, you take more st (SJP take a percentage of your wealth).
You climb a little higher, you take less st but SJP still take a percentage of your wealth.
Till one day you're up in the rarefied atmosphere and you've forgotten what st even looks like (SJP take a percentage of your wealth).
Welcome to the world of SJP son.

The greatest trick the finance industry ever pulled (possibly equal to carried interest being taxed as a capital gain; capital at risk ) was convincing the world that ad valorem fees are normal and should forever go unquestioned.

A previous PH thread on St. James's Place and their fees was, unsurprisingly - it being an area SJP excel at, like a game of find the lady.

Though I cannot offer any advice on your particular situation, it would be appreciated if (for the benefit of future PH readers/full SJP disclosure) you could seek out from SJP the original terms you signed up to, including a full breakdown of the charges over the years (and any potential exit fees), and provide them in this thread.

I suspect in the clear light of day the fees will not reflect well on SJP, with the primary defence from the resident PH SJP salesmen (sorry, "IFAs") being that it doesn't work like that anymore/things have changed/it must be a "mistake"/etc.

[alscar]

Less than 1% return in 7 years. Not even coming close to recouping the fees.

….Is that pathetic " return " net of their fees though -usually their formal statements are and is that the first time in 7 years they have told you of how poor the return is ?

[williaa68]

My mother in law has two investments with SJP - an ISA and something called an investment bond. Performance of both has been poor. My bigger issue is that I can’t even find out what the investment bond is! I’ve tried calling the so called adviser and emailing their central customer services team to no avail. I guess the next step is some sort of formal complaint?

[NumBMW]

williaa68 said:

My mother in law has two investments with SJP - an ISA and something called an investment bond. Performance of both has been poor. My bigger issue is that I can’t even find out what the investment bond is! I’ve tried calling the so called adviser and emailing their central customer services team to no avail. I guess the next step is some sort of formal complaint?

Good luck with the complaints process.
Hopefully you are retired or furloughed as you will be passed round and asked to jump through a ridiculous amount of hoops so you’ll need plenty of time and patience.

[anonymous-user]

NickCQ said:

Hard to make a decent return with such a headwind.

Exactly my reaction, too. Investors shot in the foot before they even leave the starting line.

The reality delivered in OP's case has been simply awful,
5% for us....
1% for you.

I fret that my total fees/costs are a bit high at around 1.2%!

[xeny]

Hitch said:

To be fair, a lot of five year plans must be underwater at this point given the impact of Covid on the market.

For a five year investment to be underwater at this point it would I think have to be pretty "special". Say a bet on a sector or factor that hadn't come off.

As a benchmark, Lifestrategy 20% equities is up 30% over the past 5 years, LS 100% equities is up a bit over 70%, VWRL is up 90% .

[Captain Raymond Holt]

This thread triggered a memory...

THE PROBLEM WITH SJP

[chip*]

xeny said:

Hitch said:

To be fair, a lot of five year plans must be underwater at this point given the impact of Covid on the market.

For a five year investment to be underwater at this point it would I think have to be pretty "special". Say a bet on a sector or factor that hadn't come off.

As a benchmark, Lifestrategy 20% equities is up 30% over the past 5 years, LS 100% equities is up a bit over 70%, VWRL is up 90% .

For balance (and I am not SJP fan!), the OP could have invested in some value fund which could explain the poor performance.

[anonymous-user]

It's not just St James Place, can I say a big thank you to Foresters for managing my daughters Child Trust Fund.



I could have stuck the cash in my draw and comfortably outperformed them. Hell I could have stuck 20% in a fruit machine and out performed them.

[Skyedriver]

About 15 year ago I had a meeting with a representative of SJP regarding investing the proceeds of a house sale.
i didn't take it up, dithering about and putting the money elsewhere. For a long time they kept sending out very well printed information until I asked them to stop.
After reading the OP's review, I am more than grateful that I didn't proceed.

Breathes sigh of relief. Thanks for posting.

[anonymous-user]

I never cease to be astounded by some of the goings-on at the "innocent consumer" end of the financial services trade. It truly rams home the immense value that can be obtained for free by anyone who spends a bit of time in this finance sub-forum. Over and over again it all comes back to basics,

• Use the tax wrappers (ISA/SIPP)
• Keep the costs/fees down
• Recognise that accepting some investment risk isn't the same as gambling
• Don't try to be clever - stick to mainstream investments with good diversification
• Give it time - keep those regular contributions ticking along
• And when there's a downturn - don't panic!

[tighnamara]

chip* said:

For balance (and I am not SJP fan!), the OP could have invested in some value fund which could explain the poor performance.

But surely the SJP adviser should be advising the OP.

Dam, I was having a good day until being reminded about SJP.

[xeny]

chip* said:

For balance (and I am not SJP fan!), the OP could have invested in some value fund which could explain the poor performance.

That's what i meant with "bet on a factor which hadn't come off".