St. James’s Place Wealth Management

Oakwood Solicitors Ltd specialises in Financial Litigation claims. We have a specialist in-house team dedicated to assisting clients who have lost money as a consequence of negligent advice in relation to a financial product, such as a pension or an investment.

Despite SJP being one of the UK’s biggest providers with nearly 600,000 clients, investigations by Which? alleged that in some cases, they were failing to comply with some important rules and regulations.

In 2017, the Which? team spoke to 12 advisers under the guise that they were looking for independent advice on around £100,000 investible assets, but they were soon alerted to issues.

According to Which?, SJP were misleading some potential customers about the nature of their services, which are limited compared to those offered by independent financial advisers.

Issues were also raised about advisers recommending products that would involve them earning a fee, even if more suitable, lower-cost options were available.

Questions were also raised about their charges, and lack of transparency for ongoing costs, all of which are against the rules of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

The FCA guidelines state that financial services should be honest and transparent with their clients about what costs they will pay for the services, including on-going charges. The FCA also states that clients should be informed of the cost of services both verbally and in writing.

It was found that four of the 12 SJP advisers failed to talk about costs in any detail during the Which? investigation, as well as the failure to provide this in writing.

The investigators also found discrepancies between the costs, as some said there were initial charges of 4.5% of the money invested – that’s £2,250 on a £50,000 investment, while others put the up-front cost at £2,500 (5%).

When queried about the discrepancies, SJP told Which? that some advisers may have been quoting advice fees, which are 4.5% of the initial investment, while others quoted 5%, which includes other fees.

SJP said that the discrepancies for ongoing charges may have been because some advisers quoted the annual management charge, while others quoted an estimate for all charges.

Nevertheless, the inconsistency is confusing for potential clients, who should be told about all costs when looking to invest with a company.

In 2019, the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) raised ‘serious concerns’ after their investigation found that a client had been persuaded to transfer more than £60,000 to the company, over claims that SJP had ‘doctored’ documents, with forged signatures to hide the advice allegedly given to the client by the company.

In 2023 alone, seven complaints against the firm were upheld by the Financial Ombudsman due to issues raised by clients.

More issues were uncovered in the same year when fourteen former footballers sued SJP for £15m after they alleged that they had received poor tax avoidance advice, regarding overseas property and film investment.

SJP are regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority which means customers using their services have protections to ensure they receive honest, competitive and fair deals.

It also means that if any issues arise, customers can complain and the issue should be investigated. There are also further avenues of complaint via the FOS.

If you believe you have been incorrectly advised, misled or overcharged while using SJP Wealth Management you may be able to complain and our financial litigation team, with years of experience in financial services, may be able to assist you.

We are a regulated firm of Solicitors, with over 20 years’ experience in financial mis-selling claims. By using a solicitor who is a specialist in financial mis-selling claims. We aim to take the hassle out of the claims process as we do all the hard work for you.

We will complete all the necessary paperwork and obtain all the required documentation to support your claim to ensure that your best case is put forward and maximise your chance of success.

You will be allocated your own experienced investment claims handler who will keep you fully informed throughout the whole process.

In last 3 years, we have successfully recovered in excess of £13.5 Million for our clients.