- Citywire 13 July 2010
Adviser rejects Brewin fee cut offer after trail spat
- An adviser has rejected Brewin Dolphin’s offer to cut its fees in an attempt to appease him over its practice of retaining trail commission.
Citywire broke the news that Brewin Dolphin had urged its investment mangers to use retail share classes rather than institutional classes when putting clients into funds last month. The individual teams of wealth managers were retaining the trail commission.
The tactic is used by Brewin Dolphin despite wide-spread agreement that the group would be able to use institutional shares across all of its clients.
Steve Moseley, Founder and Senior Partner of East Midlands-based Sterling McCall Asset Management, criticised discretionary manager Brewin’s policy.
Brewin responded with an offer to cut its annual management charge by 25% to 0.6%, provided Moseley placed £5 million in discretionary funds with the business.
Moseley said he would not be placing any new business with Brewin because of a lack of transparency in its approach to remuneration.
‘I’m annoyed that they have said they are willing to accommodate us only if we give them enough business,’ he said. ‘What sort of business model runs where they can alter the charges to the detriment of the client if we don’t give them enough business?’
Brewin said it had been its longstanding policy to keep any trail commissions to ‘keep our discretionary fees competitive’. It said it could not comment on specific clients without the client's written approval, but added any deviation from its standard policy on fees and commissions had to be approved by senior management.
This is an edited article from Citywire.
Back to List
Talk to us today 0844 871 8409
or email
