RE: Abdn share price16 Sep 2023 08:13
I have move my pension into a SIPP with Interactive Investor and find the interface fine, the support staff are very helpful and answer the phone quickly answered, charges are small, the interest on cash is a nice bonus and some nice features like automatic sign up to W8-BEN.
However I have found a major issue in that the FX conversion charges are very high at 1.5% up to £100,000, as I knew this when I transferred and it was not an issue until I found II have decided to have the dividends paid in DEC shares in USD, as I am very heavily invested in DEC this will give me a FX conversion charge approaching £1,000 pa. They can only make one choice for all DEC shares they hold as nominees and II tell me as default currency for DEC dividends is USD and as they are a multi currency platform they decided to go with USD. However DEC is only listed in London and can only be traded in GBP and I am resident in the UK, also I have owed these shares with 4 other brokers and all elect to have the dividends paid in GBP so the currency is converted by DEC at the current rate at the time before the dividend is distributed so no FX charges to shareholder. I have looked at various USD MM funds where I can store up the dividends and some other investments but II are very limited on what I buy in USD in my SIPP. This issue exists with other shares and I believe it also happens with GLEN which I would like to add to my SIPP at some point.
In short I will have to move my SIPP because of this issue and will do this once the claw back on cash back bonus ends (got £3000, another nice feature). From what I have seen I have am not the only one with this issue and they must be losing a number of customers because of this or at least not gaining as many as they could. I will also be moving my two limited company investment accounts soon but unfortunately now II are off the list. A real pity as everything else works well for me.