Aviva ARF

Hi, I took a tax free lump sum from a Zurich retirement bond in September this year and chose to move the balance of the funds to an Aviva ARF (as recommended by my broker).
I still have not received any details from Aviva regarding the new ARF. My broker has been very responsive to my queries but they just keep telling me that Aviva has not yet issued any details to them.
Is this unusual? It is almost three months since I sent in the ARF paperwork.
Thanks.

My experience with Aviva was that they were very slow.

They cashed in my pension funds and left them sitting for months. This was a few years ago when the stock markets were booming. When they eventually set up the ARF I had suffered a major financial loss due to the price increase in my choosen ARF investment fund. I took out a complaint with the pensions ombudsman and received compensation for the losses.

Firstly you should check the unit fund price at the time you sent the ARF opening documents and then compare this with the unit fund price when they eventually open your ARF to see if you suffered a loss.

Secondly if the ARF is not set up before the end of 2023 you will have lost out on potential earnings due to the 4% drawdown for 2023. This could be an advantage or disadvantage to you depending on your income and tax bands for 2023. This could result in you suffering a financial loss.

If you end up with losses due to Aviva's excessive delays, make a complaint directly to Aviva. If this complaint is not settled to your satisfaction, make a complaint to the ombudsman.

Thanks S class

Is it normal that ARF take longer to set up compared with annuities?

In another thread we heard it's possible to get an annuity quote over the phone and it remains valid for two weeks

Did you receive your lump sum in September? If so, that should mean that the balance of the fund was simultaneously sent to Aviva for your ARF. As a broker we do find Aviva to be painfully slow and inefficient at the moment. But not THAT slow. I'd be inclined to ring Aviva yourself, give them your name and date of birth and ask them to tell you what's happened since September.

In case it helps I know that Zurich operates a system where they can establish what the unit rates were at the time of instruction or receipt of funds. No matter what delay has occurred by the time they get to processing your instruction they can use the relevant rates so there should be no impact (positive or negative) from a delay. Given Aviva’s global brand and size I’d be surprised if they didn’t operate a similar system.

Kev1964 said:

In case it helps I know that Zurich operates a system where they can establish what the unit rates were at the time of instruction or receipt of funds. No matter what delay has occurred by the time they get to processing your instruction they can use the relevant rates so there should be no impact (positive or negative) from a delay. Given Aviva’s global brand and size I’d be surprised if they didn’t operate a similar system.

Click to expand...

Aviva is a much smaller company than Zurich. Even so, any company should be able to give the appropriate unit prices despite processing delays.

Fortune said:

Aviva is a much smaller company than Zurich. Even so, any company should be able to give the appropriate unit prices despite processing delays.

Click to expand...

Hi Fortune. I don’t think I said which one was bigger or that either of them is small. I said Aviva is a global brand and implied it was a large company. A quick Google search shows it operates in the following jurisdictions: “UK, Canada, China, India, Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Vietnam, France, Italy, Ireland, Lithuania, Poland, Turkey“.
Also…”The group has around 31,000 employees and 18 million customers. Aviva Investors has £263 billion assets under management”. We are in agreement on your final point and hopefully the OP will benefit from dealing with such a large company.

Kev1964 said:

In case it helps I know that Zurich operates a system where they can establish what the unit rates were at the time of instruction or receipt of funds. No matter what delay has occurred by the time they get to processing your instruction they can use the relevant rates so there should be no impact (positive or negative) from a delay. Given Aviva’s global brand and size I’d be surprised if they didn’t operate a similar system.

Click to expand...

Yes - all the High Street pension companies have the ability to backdate your investment in your chosen fund(s) to the date they received all their requirements including the money. My worry with the inordinate delay is that there may be some piece of documentation outstanding and Aviva can argue that they will only backdate to the date they received all their requirements. Hence my suggestion to ring them to check.

Dave Vanian said:

Did you receive your lump sum in September? If so, that should mean that the balance of the fund was simultaneously sent to Aviva for your ARF. As a broker we do find Aviva to be painfully slow and inefficient at the moment. But not THAT slow. I'd be inclined to ring Aviva yourself, give them your name and date of birth and ask them to tell you what's happened since September.

Click to expand...

Yes I received the lump sum in September. I will call Aviva directly as recommended. Thanks for the advice.

I find it odd that the broker who you're paying has not confirmed to you that the money was transferred from Aviva to Zurich in a timely manner (within two weeks is fair, I think), that all requirements were in order, that you will get the prevailing price on the date that the money was received by Zurich Life and that the only issue is issuing the policy documentation. Surely if you knew this you wouldn't have any concerns?

Yes. I appreciate that sometimes a customer call might have more influence but that shouldn't happen. Why would a provider put more weight on a customer call that that of the person placing the business with them? Complete lack of respect for the distributor.

In the last two months, funds have grown by circa 2.5%.

Some providers have upped their game lately (albeit from a low level) on speed of service. Clearly, others haven't. It's just poor management. You'd have to feel for the customer facing staff coming into work everyday and having your inbox just filled with issues that are ongoing for months.

Gerard

www.prsa.ie

Just wanted to send an update on this.
As recommended above I contacted Aviva directly and finally received a statement in the post with my ARF details.
I had told them that I expected to see an increase in the transferred balance due to the general increase in stock markets in the last couple of months and the statement confirms my ‘start date’ is backdated.
Thanks all for the advice.

Slightly different question but still related to an AVIVA ARF.

Is there a cost in transferring to an AVIVA ARF to one's spouse upon death?