Clear regular invest (Irish Life)

teednab-el

Hi guys,

Hope you can help me out here, I recently divided up my savings from the credit union and decided to transfer some of my savings over to a savings account with permanent TSB.

When I went into the bank yesterday, I asked the advisor to set up a savings account for me, I found he was taking alot of jargon to me and I didnt fully understand him eventhough I asked him on several occasions to explain , He suggested that I sign up for clear regular invest from Irish Life that it was the most popular way of saving.

I thought I was doing the right thing until I read the booklet afterwards...Part of the booklet says that Clear Regular Invest would be suitable for customers if "you dont need to protect your money and are prepared to risk getting back less than you put in". The advisor didnt explain this to me and as you know already I am not too familiar with banking terms. Basically I thought it was a savings account with no strings attached but from your monthly savings, you gain access to the growth potential of shares and bonds. I dont want to go down this road as I feel I would loose everything I saved in the first place.

Can anyone give me advice? What should I do? Is this a good solution for saving? I want to save monthly and dont plan to use my savings for a while (4-5 years) but are there better alternatives with less risk? Im not sure if I made the right choice. I have 30 days to cancel the plan i think? The advisor told me nothing about risk of loosing money. I wasnt familiar with this plan before I went in.

Cheers in advance.

coffee_cake

teednab-el wrote: »

Hi guys,

Hope you can help me out here, I recently divided up my savings from the credit union and decided to transfer some of my savings over to a savings account with permanent TSB.

When I went into the bank yesterday, I asked the advisor to set up a savings account for me, I found he was taking alot of jargon to me and I didnt fully understand him eventhough I asked him on several occasions to explain , He suggested that I sign up for clear regular invest from Irish Life that it was the most popular way of saving.

I thought I was doing the right thing until I read the booklet afterwards...Part of the booklet says that Clear Regular Invest would be suitable for customers if "you dont need to protect your money and are prepared to risk getting back less than you put in". The advisor didnt explain this to me and as you know already I am not too familiar with banking terms. Basically I thought it was a savings account with no strings attached but from your monthly savings, you gain access to the growth potential of shares and bonds. I dont want to go down this road as I feel I would loose everything I saved in the first place.

Can anyone give me advice? What should I do? Is this a good solution for saving? I want to save monthly and dont plan to use my savings for a while (4-5 years) but are there better alternatives with less risk? Im not sure if I made the right choice. I have 30 days to cancel the plan i think? The advisor told me nothing about risk of loosing money. I wasnt familiar with this plan before I went in.

Cheers in advance.

Hi OP
The problem with gaining access to "growth potential of shares" is that shares go up and down as you know. There would be no way for the bank to give you the ups without the downs, not without crippling you to a very low return. The more possibility of return is pretty linked to risk.
I think you should speak to a different advisor in the bank, explain what has happened and tell them the original one used a lot of jargon and you need to be taken through it in basic laymans terms.

teednab-el

bluewolf wrote: »

Hi OP
The problem with gaining access to "growth potential of shares" is that shares go up and down as you know. There would be no way for the bank to give you the ups without the downs, not without crippling you to a very low return. The more possibility of return is pretty linked to risk.
I think you should speak to a different advisor in the bank, explain what has happened and tell them the original one used a lot of jargon and you need to be taken through it in basic laymans terms.

Cheers for the reply bluewolf,

To be honest the advisor didnt mention anything about shares, I know if he did I wont be going down that road for sure. Talking to two of my mates, they are on the 40 Day Notice Savings Account. Im surprised he didnt put me on that. I have done some research on it now and I think it should be suitable for me, I want to have control over what I put in to my savings, For example if I put 500 away a month, I expect to have my €6000 of savings by the end of the year plus interest if available, (€500 x 12 months) and nothing less. Money is hard earned and if there is a risk of lower returns, then I feel I need to opt out of the plan. Also I wouldnt be 100% sure if I would need my savings before the 5 year period and if you did you would have to pay withdrawal charges.

Advice again appreciated.

teednab-el

Jim2007

teednab-el wrote: »

Hi guys,

Hope you can help me out here, I recently divided up my savings from the credit union and decided to transfer some of my savings over to a savings account with permanent TSB.

When I went into the bank yesterday, I asked the advisor to set up a savings account for me, I found he was taking alot of jargon to me and I didnt fully understand him eventhough I asked him on several occasions to explain , He suggested that I sign up for clear regular invest from Irish Life that it was the most popular way of saving.

I thought I was doing the right thing until I read the booklet afterwards...Part of the booklet says that Clear Regular Invest would be suitable for customers if "you dont need to protect your money and are prepared to risk getting back less than you put in". The advisor didnt explain this to me and as you know already I am not too familiar with banking terms. Basically I thought it was a savings account with no strings attached but from your monthly savings, you gain access to the growth potential of shares and bonds. I dont want to go down this road as I feel I would loose everything I saved in the first place.

Can anyone give me advice? What should I do? Is this a good solution for saving? I want to save monthly and dont plan to use my savings for a while (4-5 years) but are there better alternatives with less risk? Im not sure if I made the right choice. I have 30 days to cancel the plan i think? The advisor told me nothing about risk of loosing money. I wasnt familiar with this plan before I went in.

Cheers in advance.

As you are saving for the short term, then clearly any investment type account is not suitable for your purpose and you should cancel it without delay.

Depending on how strong you feel about the situation, I you could also make a written complaint to the bank, as the advisor failed completely in giving you proper information about the product.

Sorry I can recommend any alternative, as I'm unfamiliar with their products.

Jim (Switzerland)

teednab-el

Jim2007 wrote: »

As you are saving for the short term, then clearly any investment type account is not suitable for your purpose and you should cancel it without delay.

Depending on how strong you feel about the situation, I you could also make a written complaint to the bank, as the advisor failed completely in giving you proper information about the product.

Sorry I can recommend any alternative, as I'm unfamiliar with their products.

Jim (Switzerland)

Cheers Jim for your advice and thoughts.

He sold it to me very poorly indeed, But it was my fault too that I signed up for it in the first place. should have walked out on the spot, I learned a valuable lesson for the future. I was in two minds about the decision but the advisor did tell me that I had 30 days to cancel if I changed my mind. I have put in 10,000 as a lumpsum into this account, I think I will go back to them during the week when I talk to a few people about the suitation. Need to take my time on this to gather as much information as possible. The account doesnt activate until 20 Jan where the first payments will be transferred from my current account to this account.

I assume I shouldnt have any problems cancelling this plan? Is there any withdrawal charges or anything I should be aware of etc? Trying to learn as I go along.

Cheers.

teednab-el

Kennie1

No charges for canceling the policy once it within the 30 days, just send all the paper work back and mark it "freepost" Just make sure you send in a letter explaining why you are canceling the policy as I am sure they would love to know that their products are being mis-sold! Outragous that they are still mis-selling after the Prime time investigation in 2008:mad: