We are urging former clients of controversial Ayrshire-based firm, Turnberry Wealth Management to get in touch. We believe they are able to make a claim against the failed financial firm.
The company had been advising clients to invest in high risk, unregulated schemes that were unsuitable for them. It went into liquidation in March 2015,
Liquidation for the firm
After going into liquidation, the firm was declared to be in default by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). This was after it lost three cases against the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).
The amount it was ordered to pay its clients in compensation is not entirely clear. However, media reports have suggested that Turnberry Wealth Management was ordered to pay £15,000 to one client. In another case, the FOS allegedly ordered financial redress of £83,000.
Inability to pay
It is believed that the firm’s inability to pay these claims and more imminent claims against it led to Turnberry Wealth Management having to enter administration, which left the FSCS picking up the bill to compensate clients for the losses they suffered as a result of the unsuitable advice provided.
At the heart of the FSCS’s decisions against Turnberry Wealth Management was the fact that it has advised clients to invest in high risk, unregulated and unsuitable schemes. In one case, Turnberry advised a client to invest in three unregulated, collective investment schemes just three years before she retired, and in another, the client was left with 50 per cent of his non pension assets in unregulated investments.
In yet another case, the Ombudsman held that one client had limited liquid assets and significant liabilities.
Pension fraud
This was not the first time that Turnberry Wealth Management or its personnel have courted controversy. In 2013, one of its directors, Martin Brown, was alleged to have been at the centre of alleged pension fraud. The Pensions Regulator held that Brown did not have the required level of knowledge or understanding to be a trustee of an occupational scheme.
A later investigation by the Pensions Regulator revealed that a visit to the company’s premises identified a document on an employee’s desk which appeared to give inaccurate answers regarding tax penalties and transactions and that these answers must have been designed to give customers inaccurate advice when responding to customer enquiries.
Turnberry Wealth Management
Did you have had dealings with this controversial firm and lost money as a result? Get in touch as our team of experts can offer support and advice.