wpsadvisory.com Reviews 185

I moved to WPS Lifestage from Moneyhub at the last minute which went ok despite glitches on the desktop app which made it unusable towards the end of moneyhub ownership. This error still exists btw.

Clearly corporate mergers and acquisitions are a fact of life but in this instance the service has definitely dropped once the acquisition was announced and now after migration one of my bank account connections does not work. This happened a few times over the years I used moneyhub and was promptly supported to resolution each time.

Now the lifestage app support team seem to not be as well trained or capable as moneyhub team and are asking for long winded explanations of problems including screen recordings of errors. This never used to be necessary with moneyhub. Also did WPS support team not think ahead and realise you cannot take screen recordings/shots of open banking setup in banking apps!?

The errors should be observable by the operations team - if not please improve the logging and monitoring of your application!

Please take ownership and sort out your technical problems with the connection to my bank account or give me my money back please.

Note. the presumption / expectation that I have time to troubleshoot is as bad as the expectation that I know how to. Clearly this support is not aimed at an elderly relative.l!!? Empathy training needed. I won't go into my current family and life challenges in public!

Note2. I have a second error (on desktop) mentioned above but it's been ignored / conflated / masked by the banking connection error on the support chain.

To add insult to injury the WPS agent said they would escalate my issue last week but still hasn't so I guess that means we are blocked!? Seems like its time to change finance app vendor!

My company funds independent financial advice from WPS for retirees. I found the initial WPS process to be fairly perfunctory while personal data was being acquired and processed, but that all changed from first contact with my advisor Jamie Evans.
Jamie very quickly established my level of understanding of finances and pensions and built on that to establish my pension options. I had complete confidence that all options appropriate to my personal situation (including transfer out) were being considered without bias. I found Jamie to be open and very easy to talk to. After Teams meetings he provided concise written summaries of key points, options available and their relative merits. We iterated and refined my options through Teams meetings and, at points where I needed to provide further data, by email. If I had felt anything was unclear or not quite right there was always an open invitation to get back to Jamie. Although I knew my pensions reasonably well, Jamie was able to suggest plans of actions I hadn’t thought of and also saved me from a costly mistake. That and the peace of mind provided by independent review would have definitely provided good value had I been paying myself.
During the process Jamie also identified some other areas where I could potentially benefit from further advice. These were made clear in a professional and informative way, but without pressure and with the door left open to separately review these with WPS.
The entire process took quite a lot longer than I anticipated, mainly due to the processes of obtaining pension information at various points, but both the WPS financial advice and the manner in which it was provided were excellent.

I'm one of those who had to migrate from Moneyhub. I was informed I needed to do so just TWO days before my subscription expired, and told if I didnt, all my data would be lost (so a good job I wasnt away for the week ....).

The migration itself seemed to work just fine, however I only had one day of subscription left after my move. I was informed that we would get a free month as part of the migration, but there was no sign of that. I Finally got the promised 30 days a few days later after various attempts to contact them.

Contact was finally establised via my initial (poor) review and they helped to figure out why their helpdesk communications were not reaching me (which we did). Call out to Lucy for that.

This extra effort is appreciated and l have therefore regraded this up to four stars now. I really cant give five due to the very short period I was given to migrate, and the missing 30 days for four days.

I will be subscribing again when the 30 days expires.

The transfer from MoneyHub to WPS has been a disaster. I've lost access to my data and there's no indication that it'll be fixd anytime soon. Two days now and no progress. WPS have my financial data and my HSBC connection. Unbelievably shoddy. If this doesnt get resolved in the next 48hrs I'll take legal action.

Simon Litchfield and the team at WPS have been consistently helpful and diligent from the beginning of our association with them to where we are now on the cusp of completion. I cannot speak too highly about the care and expertise they exhibited throughout the entire process - nothing was too much trouble. They steered us through the options and possibilities, fully discussing the pros and cons of every product at every turn. We have never had any difficulty in contacting them and email queries have always been answered and returned either the same day or the next. We have never had to chase and have always had fulsome and constructive replies to our questions. We would recommend them without reserve.

Jamie Evans helped me with financial advice regarding my workplace pension. This involved a whole financial assessment and was not just about the pension, which was very helpful. It can be a bit daunting and sometimes it’s difficult to face all of the facts. Jamie put me at ease, was supportive, explained the situation and implications very well. I felt in good hands, I was given information about matters unique to my situation that could be very significant in the future. Previously I had no idea about this. The session was very worthwhile.

We spoke to Martin Winter today about my pension options. We had already provided some financial data and this along with my company pension data was the basis of the discussion. Martin was very easy to talk to and his advice was very useful presenting us with different approaches. It was a very worthwhile discussion.

I spoke with Martin Winter from WPS Advisory and was extremely happy with the information I was given. It was comprehensive and explained to me very clearly. The range of options open to me was well explained and any jargon quickly run through. Altogether an extremely positive experience which has left me with a full understanding of what my options are and how to approach my financial planning. Excellent guidance.
M Brayshaw.

Good advice with the information that was submitted to the financial advisor.

had a great call today with Martin who was well prepared and guided me through the process in a friendly, relaxed but professional manner. Very happy with everything and very grateful for the support & assistance

I’ve been speaking to WPS about my options as a member of the BBC pension scheme. The contact and information gathering process went smoothly and efficiently and led to an excellent and informative session with Martin Winter. Martin gave me clear and easily understandable advice regarding my BBC pension options but also helped me start the process of what I should be doing with a number of other pensions that require consolidation. Highly recommend WPS and their approach.

Simon Litchfield at WPS reviewed all my pensions amazingly so quickly and he was able to grasp all the options available to me with pros and cons for each option explained in simple terms. I have few final salary pensions as well the work and upcoming state pension. He took time in looking at the terms of each policy and gave me 2-3- best options available to me. All this was done within 3 weeks. I would certainly recommend Simon to anyone who is looking for advice on how best to take make decision in choosing the pension options

***Background
I needed to show that I had received support for this proposed transfer as a FCA regulatory requirement.
I had initial discussions with a few IFAs – all were only interested in obtaining (a) the maximum fee they could, explaining the complexity of the regulatory requirement, and the risk to the IFA if they got the advice wrong, and (b) wanting to move forward by tying any support they offered to an ongoing managed investment fee!

***WPS Advisory
After such a poor experience with a number of IFAs, I realised that WPS Advisory have been appointed by the trustees of the Vodafone defined benefit pension scheme.
I reviewed their website, checked them out on the FCA site (but failed to look further, i.e. Trustpilot). As far as I could tell at that point, everything looked very professional, and it seemed silly for me not to engage with them.
I had a couple of introductory calls (I am not very trusting and had a few questions). I was given full details of their process and costs from the outset. Everything was logical (more so if I had read the material fully!). I then completed an online questionnaire (a bit simplistic, which initially worried me, but this was my failure to appreciate the straightforward process that would evolve and which was documented in the material they sent me anyway). Clearly, because of the regulatory requirements, and the positive recommendation I was seeking, I was concerned about the costs involved, particularly as I already mentioned the “money grabbing” IFAs I had already spoken to.
Costs were fully documented and (a) subsidised by my pension scheme and (b) a fraction of the cost I had been quoted by others.
Longer appointments were scheduled during which I was able to explain in some detail my circumstances, and reason/justification for seeking the transfer of my defined benefits pension fund to a SIPP.
I dealt with:
• Charlie Bettison CertCII, DipPFS Consultant.
Charlie gave me the confidence to move forward after I had a number of questions answered in the initial contact stage. Charming guy, who I immediately trusted.
• Simon Litchfield DipPFS BA Hons - Adviser & Technical Specialist
Simon was my key advisor, someone who allowed me to disagree with him (which I did quite a lot!), but also thankfully challenged my thought process behind the reason for transfer and the proposed destination of funds (should I receive a positive recommendation from WPS). Simon contacted me a couple of times during the post-recommendation stage to ensure all was progressing with the transfer.
• Rhiannon Richardson - Senior Administrator (Admin Team).
Without Rhiannon (and Sharon) who made exceptional efforts to keep me up to date with the paperwork which I needed to complete (once I got a positive recommendation from Simon for the transfer). They marked sections in PDFs where I needed to add additional information (mostly all documentation was pre-completed by Rhiannon & team) and marked the location for the many signatures I needed to provide. Without Rhiannon and team my transfer would not have taken place.

***Conclusion
I was allowed to transfer my funds from defined benefit to a SIPP due to a positive recommendation. My circumstances supported this. It is a long process, but exceptionally supported by the whole WPS team. Both the level of support by WPS and the (low) cost to me were exceptional.

The information service provide by my Technical adviser Mr. Jamie Evans was very clear and well explained, with no open questions from my side.

Really helpful and friendly .Explained everything well . The process was very good and informative.

Brilliant service from Simon Litchfield I cannot recommend him enough helped me and kept me informed all through the process many thanks

Ref to one you. Mistakes on documents delays. Bad advice. Wrong fund transferred. Etc etc absolutely hopeless. Poor is not enough. Advisor had a false Facebook page with false reviews. Now page cannot be found.....

Clear and comprehensive advice on my personal pension arrangements. No pressure and calm manners from the two advisors that I dealt with.

My employer outsourced WPS for advice on its pension scheme. I thought I was pretty certain of my preferred option before the meeting with Martin, but concluded differently by the end of it. Through Martin's clear painting of a bigger picture in my overall circumstances, and some figures to support it, it became apparent that the different option made more sense. Very pleased with the advice I received!

WPS have been appointed by the trustees of my company's defined benefit pension to provide financial advice. I had an introductory call and then a longer appointment during which I received advice specific to my circumstances. Before contacting them I thought I had a plan for retirement but they encouraged me to think about alternatives and I did actually change my plan. Both Brian and Martin were very personable and their advice was clear and very helpful. I now have a clearer way forward as I approach retirement.