Articles and Reports

Policyholder Advocate hits Roadshow Trail in Edinburgh

Clare Spottiswoode and members of her team launched the nationwide series of meet the Policyholder Advocate events on January 10 in Edinburgh.
More than 110 eligible Scottish policyholders braved a cold and stormy evening to attend the event held at the Sheraton Grand Hotel in the city's Festival Square and the meeting proved both lively and stimulating.
OPA research manager Kate Anastasi took the audience through a clear and user-friendly explanation of the technical issues behind the Norwich Union plan before Clare described her role and dealt with a range of the issues she must grapple with in the forthcoming negotiations with Norwich Union.
A wide range of questions was put to the team and the Edinburgh attendees also acted as test pilots for 'ask the audience-style' voting handsets which will be used throughout the roadshows to gauge views on a series of questions.
"My aim - and my office's and advisors' aim - is to do the best deal we possibly can for you as policyholders. That means we have to check all the Norwich Union numbers; we are not going to accept things at face value," Clare told them.
And she highlighted the importance of the deal to each and every policyholder.
"Each one of you will be asked for every one of your policies - do you want to accept this offer or not? That's a personal choice for you.
"It is you who will be giving up your personal rights to the 90 per cent of future distributions in return for a mainly cash payment."

What Edinburgh asked Clare:

Q. Are the long term beneficiaries just going to be the shareholders and the board and employees of Aviva?
A. Clearly Aviva is not going to do this unless it is in their interests. So there is a true negotiation to be had to make sure that we get the best deal for you but Aviva still goes ahead.
Q. How much less than 90 per cent should policyholders accept?
A. Unfortunately it is an impossible question at this stage. How close we're going to get to the 90 is also not just in our hands - some of that depends on what the regulation of this industry is going to be like in the future.
Q. I have a policy that expires on 20 January can I have a categorical assurance that I will be included in this negotiation?
A. Yes, you will. As long as your policy was in place on 21 November and it matures on the date it was always set to mature and you are not voluntarily choosing to surrender your policy, then you will absolutely be included.
Q. If we vote for reattribution would our policies still get the reversionary bonuses and terminal bonus?
A. Yes.
Q. What about policies that do not have maturity dates such as with-profits bonds?
A. This question demonstrates how complex the task is. We are dealing with a wide range of products and our final advice will be set out in a way that groups policyholders and their products. It will be important for policyholders to discuss individual circumstances with their financial advisers.
Q. What are the tax implications of taking the cash likely to be?
A. We are hoping that the payments will be tax free both for income and for capital gains. That is not completely confirmed yet but that's what we are aiming for.
Q. Past performance has been poor the last four or five years and many people surrendered their policies because they saw no end to poor performance. Could we consider taking the date of qualification back before November 21?
A. We will be looking very carefully at the figures and if we find that those policyholders had been underpaid we may have, but if there were any sense that those policyholders had been underpaid I think we will have a duty to look at it. But if we do everyone has to remember that when we make a decision like that we are taking money from other policyholders.
At the end of the event the audience were asked to use their voting pads to deliver instant feedback on the roadshow event. Most attendees found the event informative, interesting and enjoyable with just one describing it as boring and a small handful as hard work.

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