Donate to Remove ads

Got a credit card? use our Credit Card & Finance Calculators

Thanks to johnstevens77,Bhoddhisatva,scotia,Anonymous,Cornytiv34, for Donating to support the site

ISA providers and charges

Investment discussion for beginners. Why you should invest your money, get help getting started
Nimrod103
Lemon Half
Posts: 6469
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 6:10 pm
Has thanked: 939 times
Been thanked: 2256 times

ISA providers and charges

#210498

Postby Nimrod103 » March 26th, 2019, 8:46 pm

I was reading this article:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/investing/i ... attle-10k/

And I was taken aback by the colour coded table of different costs of running ISA accounts. I have some money with Hargreaves Lansdowne which the article says is the most expensive provider. Has anyone any views on whether the high charges bring any benefit, or whether for this years ISA I should open an account with Halifax Share Dealing, who are one of the cheapest?

Urbandreamer
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3121
Joined: December 7th, 2016, 9:09 pm
Has thanked: 347 times
Been thanked: 1025 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#210510

Postby Urbandreamer » March 26th, 2019, 9:43 pm

Your link is behind a paywall. However I suspect that it's like this MoneyObserver report from 2017.
https://www.moneyobserver.com/our-analy ... nt-brokers

I would like to reasure you that HL is not the most expensive provider, but I can't. I could of course argue that they are in fact cheap with some justification.

The issue is that different providers charge significantly differently. There are providers that are cheap, provided that you trade often. They are not if you trade seldom. There are providers who are cheap if you avoid funds, but charge significantly for holding funds.

Then again, do you expect the same service from all providers? I personally expect a damn sight more, and get it, from one of my providers than I expect or require from another. However one is cheap and the other expensive.

Should you open an account with Halifax? Not knowing your situation I can't comment.

However I have accounts with three providers.

A J Bell and Selftrade now have roughly similar charges for running the accounts. Historically Selftrade was significantly cheaper and provided poorer service. I think that for many both may be cheaper than HL, I would hope that HL provides a premium service to justify the difference.
My 3'ed account is with a traditional stockbroker and depending upon use could easily make HL look cheap, or not.
My custardy charge is capped at about £150, but my dealing fees are NOT and are a percentage of the amount of the deal! The commission of a recent sale was far larger than that charge.

PS, I've not heard of a bad word about HL, while (not that I agree) I certainly have about both SelfTrade and A J Bell.

AleisterCrowley
Lemon Half
Posts: 6381
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 11:35 am
Has thanked: 1880 times
Been thanked: 2026 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#210526

Postby AleisterCrowley » March 26th, 2019, 10:42 pm

My custardy charge is capped at about £150

I pay extra for the Blancmange option

TedSwippet
Lemon Slice
Posts: 577
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 12:57 pm
Has thanked: 134 times
Been thanked: 299 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#210573

Postby TedSwippet » March 27th, 2019, 9:06 am

Nimrod103 wrote:... or whether for this years ISA I should open an account with Halifax Share Dealing, who are one of the cheapest?

As already noted, which platform will be the most cost-effective for you depends entirely on your requirements and on what you plan to invest in on it. If you enter some details and assumptions into this site, it will show you a price comparison:

http://www.comparefundplatforms.com/

For what it's worth, I am a long-time and satisfied iWeb customer. I just ran this comparison site against my portfolio. Over ten years, it shows iWeb's cost impact as £678, and HL's as £44,994 (these numbers are not typos!). Of course, this is because I hold funds and OEICs, not shares, investment trusts or ETFs, and HL overcharge egregiously for funds.

Still, that is a pretty eye-watering loss down purely to choice of platform. I don't know what extra service would justify nearly £4,500/year on average for me -- maybe HL could come round twice a week to clean my house and mow the lawn?! I am fairly sure that there are a lot of people who have shrugged off HL's 0.45% annual fee because when expressed this way it just looks small. Over time though, and particularly on sizeable portfolios, such as a pension close to the lifetime allowance, its effect is far, far from small.

starquake
Posts: 25
Joined: February 14th, 2019, 5:59 pm
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 14 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#210800

Postby starquake » March 27th, 2019, 4:52 pm

I'd also not discount ii from any comparison, they are relatively cheap for ISA at a flat 90 quid/yr charge (which is refunded in trade credits, which you'd spend on the other platforms anyway). If you are investing monthly over a long time, ii is one of cheapest arguably, especially for OIEC funds, and you don't spend money on trades due to the credit (which rolls over up to about 90 quid!). My maths when I last ran it said ii is one of cheapest once you hit £40k of funds held... but it may have changed recently - do you own checks and calulations for your circumstances

The service is so-so, the platform not as "spiffy" as rivals, but overall in my years of investing, I have not really had any complaints.

iWeb is likely cheaper than ii though!

gryffron
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3605
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 10:00 am
Has thanked: 550 times
Been thanked: 1584 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#211054

Postby gryffron » March 28th, 2019, 12:23 pm

I have an account with Halifax sharedealing and they are fine. Everything works and is fairly quick.

It must be one of the most old fashioned looking websites on the entire internet. Almost all bare text. But that isn't necessarily a terrible thing. It works just fine. Selftrade's flashy new one is far harder to use :(

I believe iWeb is cheaper for an ISA. Halifax have a £25 annual fee and iWeb do not. Is that correct?

Gryff

Watis
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 1403
Joined: November 5th, 2016, 10:53 am
Has thanked: 352 times
Been thanked: 489 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#211076

Postby Watis » March 28th, 2019, 1:18 pm

AleisterCrowley wrote:My custardy charge is capped at about £150

I pay extra for the Blancmange option


£150?

'tis but a trifle . . .

Watis

AleisterCrowley
Lemon Half
Posts: 6381
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 11:35 am
Has thanked: 1880 times
Been thanked: 2026 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#211078

Postby AleisterCrowley » March 28th, 2019, 1:26 pm

'de minimis non curat lex'

kempiejon
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3488
Joined: November 5th, 2016, 10:30 am
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 1145 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#211094

Postby kempiejon » March 28th, 2019, 2:22 pm

gryffron wrote:I have an account with Halifax sharedealing and they are fine. Everything works and is fairly quick.

It must be one of the most old fashioned looking websites on the entire internet. Almost all bare text. But that isn't necessarily a terrible thing. It works just fine. Selftrade's flashy new one is far harder to use :(

I believe iWeb is cheaper for an ISA. Halifax have a £25 annual fee and iWeb do not. Is that correct?

Gryff


Halifax charge me £12.50 for my ISA; iweb have a one off joining fee which I thought was £100 but I've just looked and according to their website is £25.

onthemove
Lemon Slice
Posts: 540
Joined: June 24th, 2017, 4:03 pm
Has thanked: 722 times
Been thanked: 471 times

Re: ISA providers and charges

#211697

Postby onthemove » March 31st, 2019, 5:08 pm

Nimrod103 wrote:And I was taken aback by the colour coded table of different costs of running ISA accounts. I have some money with Hargreaves Lansdowne which the article says is the most expensive provider. Has anyone any views on whether the high charges bring any benefit, or whether for this years ISA I should open an account with Halifax Share Dealing, who are one of the cheapest?


I started with a Halifax account and am still with them (now 2 accounts - 1x ISA and 1x non-ISA) well over 15 yrs later. If I were starting out now, I'd happily make Halifax my first choice again, and happily recommend to anyone looking at starting out just wanting a trustable, basic, easy to use, easy to deal with stock broker.

I did subsequently also have a Barclays account for broker diversification, but shifted that to Hargreaves Lansdown when Barclays upped their annual custody charges to a % fee. In my view there's no justification for a (un-capped) % fee. I can understand a % for small values to act as a loss leader, but Barclays new fees started off from the point where others applied a limit!

I don't find HL expensive for normal holdings. I suspect they might be for funds, but the custody charges for regular shares are reasonable (not percentage based, at least for large holdings). And the dealing fees are also fixed per trade. Perhaps not the cheapest but way cheaper than if you ever handle certified holdings.

I purposely don't go for the cheapest - particularly not when the broker is just a broker and doesn't have other operations (unlike a bank like Halifax).

In answer to your specific question, for me, when it comes to higher charges, well, there needs to be something in it for the broker to stay in business and cover their costs! I don't mind paying a reasonable annual charge for the services. (Just not an unjustifiable, uncapped % fee)

Between Halifax and HL I actually prefer Halifax as a user. I really don't understand what all the faffing is with HL having a separate 'capital' account. You don't just have a simple cash balance, end of story. For some reason with HL dividends go temporarily into a holding account, before being moved where you use them to invest. I really don't see what the point of all that is, and it makes it difficult to see just what you've currently got available to invest.

"whether for this years ISA I should open an account with Halifax Share Dealing, who are one of the cheapest?"


It's up to you. I have both, but that's because I've a fair sum in the stock market, so broker diversification is a must for me.

But if you don't want/need the broker diversification, if you open a Halifax (and presumably keep your HL), then won't you end up paying 2 lots of annual custody fees? (For me that's worth it for the diversification, but relative to my holding size it's negligible - I look on it as a small insurance premium; even with HL and Halifax combined, the combined fees for me are cheaper than Barclays were wanting to charge me!)


Return to “How Do I Invest”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 5 guests