St. James's Place Wealth Management Plc · DRN-5704342

The complaint Mr S complains St. James's Place Wealth Management Plc (SJP) mis-sold him a reviewable whole of life assurance policy, that it failed to provide him with ongoing suitability reviews and of administrative issues relating to the policy. What happened Mr S was advised by SJP in 1994 to take out a reviewable whole of life policy, which he recalls being to protect his mortgage. Around 2014, following a scheduled review of the policy, Mr S started to have concerns about how it was sold to him. He asked SJP at this time to provide him with the original information and documentation for his policy, including the commission arrangements, but doesn’t recall SJP providing that documentation. In 2024 he continued to be dissatisfied with a number of aspects about his policy which he raised as a complaint to SJP. He said: • SJP should’ve instead advised a term assurance policy as he only wanted to cover his mortgage for its term, rather than whole of life which continued past his mortgage settlement. • The policy included no bonus payments or earned growth for it to have been worthwhile over a term assurance policy. • The key features hadn’t been explained to him. • Changes were made to the policy terms – having received letters about increasing the premium or reducing the sum assured. • The policy hadn’t been reassigned from his mortgage lender to another beneficiary when his mortgage came to an end. • He’d no contact from SJP about his policy for many years, including any ongoing suitability review of his policy.

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SJP considered his complaint and upheld it in part. It said: • The policy sold was suitable for Mr S, but even so he had raised this matter outside the regulatory time limits. • It hadn’t agreed, and wasn’t obligated, to provide Mr S with ongoing advice to assess the policy’s ongoing suitability for him. • The policy benefit has been reassigned to Mr S on 2 November 2023, shortly after it had received the lender’s letter of no interest. It accepts that Mr S ought to have been sent confirmation of that change and that it didn’t send one. • The onus was on Mr S to update his address in 2001 and it took reasonable steps to contact him. • When he updated his address in 2008, he told SJP the incorrect door number which led to further contact issues. But when he later corrected that in 2023, SJP accepts it didn’t update it properly across all its systems. For the issues around not sending the beneficiary change confirmation letter and for not updating Mr S’ address across all its systems correctly, SJP offered him £150 compensation as an apology for those matters. Mrs S didn’t feel SJP had fairly answered his complaint and referred it to our service to consider. One of our Investigators looked into the matter and first considered which parts of Mr S’ complaint fell within our jurisdiction given the passage of time since some of the matters he complained of took place. Her findings were that we couldn’t consider the sale of the policy as it was out of time, but the rest of his complaint fell within the remit of our service. A position I’ve not seen to disagree with. She then considered the merits of the parts of Mr S’ complaint we could consider but didn’t find SJP needed to do more than it had already offered. Mr S disagreed with her conclusions, explaining this was because SJP had failed to provide the original documentation, which in his view should’ve been retained for the life of the contract, it hadn’t provided him with annual contract information, and the firm made little effort to contact him during the period it didn’t have his correct address. Our Investigator considered Mr S’ further points but didn’t change her view of his complaint. As an agreement wasn’t reached Mr S’ complaint was passed to me to decide. What I’ve decided – and why I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. Having done so I also won’t be upholding Mr S’ complaint, largely for the same reasons our Investigator didn’t. I know this matter is important to Mr S and I’d like to assure him I understand why he feels SJP has treated him unfairly. But for me to conclude it did I would

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need to be satisfied that it’s likely SJP failed to meet its obligations to Mr S, and that caused him detriment. Some of what Mr S has said in his complaint touches on the reviewable nature of his policy – that being reviews of his policy that require increases to the premium or reduction in the sum assured outside of the indexation element of his policy. Aspects around that would be against the policy provider itself, which is another firm within SJP’s group. I won’t consider that aspect here as I can’t make a determination against a firm that isn’t responsible for those acts and / or omissions. I’ll address the rest of his complaint within the following sections. Suitability reviews Mr S has alleged that SJP ought to have given him regular advice about the ongoing suitability of his policy. But I’ve not seen SJP agreed or would otherwise be obligated to provide that service. SJP does offer under the services it provides its customers an optional ongoing advice service, which following the implementation of RDR in December 2012 has tended to take the form of a regular fee being collected from the value of the products under that service – typically 0.5%. In return for that fee an ongoing suitability review is usually included. Mr S took out his policy before RDR when SJP would provide ongoing advice if it specifically contracted with him to. I’ve seen no such evidence of any such agreement, service being provided or fee being paid that could infer such an agreement was in place. SJP also note that given his policy was for protection it wouldn’t’ typically provide ongoing advice for that at that time. Mr S was likely charged commissions under the pre-RDR arrangements, which usually took the form of payments being made to SJP by the policy provider over the life of the contract – which SJP has suggested as much. That arrangement covers the cost of providing advice and doesn’t in my view automatically infer that SJP would be giving him ongoing advice about his policy given the absence of any evidence to suggest otherwise. There is mention within the file of SJP trying to arrange meetings with Mr S. But I’ve not seen any evidence that related to ongoing advice regarding his policy, it’s more likely in my view this was to introduce more of its services to him to see what else it could offer him, a sales call essentially. It follows then I’m not persuaded SJP was required to provide Mr S with ongoing advice about the suitability of his policy. Original documentation Not all the original documentation is available anymore, of particular concern to Mr S is the original policy terms. Given the passage of time since this policy was sold to Mr S in 1994, I can’t fairly make any adverse inferences against SJP for that no longer being available. I understand Mr S feels as his policy is still live that SJP ought to have retained it. But I don’t agree. I say this because at the time there was no obligation in place for SJP to retain some of the documentation for as long as Mr S feels it should. It isn’t unreasonable then it isn’t able to provide him with a copy of all the documentation he asked of it. I’ve also not seen based on the terms I have been provided with, from 2007, there was likely any such agreement for SJP to annually, or at any interval, provide a copy of the policy terms.

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SJP were able to provide some documentation from the sale, but where that part of his complaint is out of time I won’t say any more about that. As SJP no longer held the documentation Mr S wanted, I can’t fairly say it inconvenienced him by not providing it when he asked it to in 2014. Mr S has questioned the validity of the contract without the original documentation, but that is a matter between him and the policy provider, rather than SJP here who only sold it and appears to arrange some of the administrative tasks around it. It isn’t my view then that SJP has treated Mr S unfairly by being limited in the original documentation it has about his policy. Address and Beneficiary While the original terms are no longer available, it is a common term of most financial agreements that the onus when a consumer changes an address is on them to notify the firm. SJP says the first it became aware Mr S had moved from the original address it had known for him was when it received returned mail it sent to him as “gone away”. As I would expect it to here, SJP appears to have placed a restriction on any further mail being sent and took reasonable steps to locate Mr S. In my view it approaching his mortgage lender to do so was reasonable where it would likely be well placed to pass correspondence, which included address change requests, onto Mr S. In my view SJP can’t fairly be held responsible for any communications it asked Mr S’ mortgage lender to pass to him as that third party is outside of its control. While there were other steps SJP could’ve taken, given the steps it had taken and the likely onus being on Mr S to update his address with it, I can’t fairly say it isn’t unreasonable it did more. Once Mr S had eventually received the address change request in 2008, a copy of which I’ve been provided with, I note while most of the address is complete which is the same as where Mr S resides now, the door number was incorrect. As Mr S provided that information to SJP, I can’t fairly say it was unreasonable it thought to rely on it. Once SJP received the correct address in October 2023 it has said the update wasn’t completed across all its systems. That in my view ought not to have happened given Mr S did provide what he needed to, and I’ve seen no evidence SJP asked him to do more than he did. I’m satisfied however that it has since resolved that issue and the offer it has already made to Mr S fairly compensates him for the inconvenience caused by that mistake. Turning to the change of beneficiary, a matter which SJP appears to accept responsibility for rather than the policy provider, I’m satisfied that SJP wouldn’t have been able to change that without consent of the original beneficiary, here Mr S’ mortgage lender at the time. SJP says that letter was dated 2 November 2023 and it appears in my view to have acted in a reasonable period of that. Even if it didn’t, given the policy hasn’t been claimed on I’m not persuaded any detriment has been caused if it did take later than is said to have happened. SJP has explained that its standard process is to send a letter of acknowledgement for such changes, but one wasn’t sent here for Mr S. I think that caused Mr S worry and inconvenience as he wanted assurance that the policy had been reassigned away from the lender of his mortgage, which had come to an end some years ago by this point. But in my view I’ve not seen the inconvenience caused to Mr S goes beyond what the offer SJP has already made fairly acknowledges.

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Summary In my view having considered this matter, I’m satisfied for the reasons I’ve given above that the offer SJP has already made of £150 is fair and reasonable. If it hasn’t already paid that to Mr S then I direct it to. If it already has, then it doesn’t need to anything more to resolve this matter. My final decision For the reasons given above, I direct SJP to pay Mr S £150, if it hasn’t done so already. Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mr S to accept or reject my decision before 23 April 2026. Ken Roberts Ombudsman

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