Ann Armstrong from Castleford got back £2,300 from Halifax

In March 2002 Mrs Armstrong had managed to accumulate a lump sum by saving regularly from her salary. She agreed to meet with a financial adviser to discuss the various options she had for these savings.

Mrs Armstrong was advised to invest a lump sum of £3,000 into a Stocks and Shares ISA at the time. She hadn’t invested money before and the adviser explained that ISAs offered the opportunity for her investment to grow free of tax over the longer term. Mrs Armstrong left her investment in place for 7 years and received back just over £2,400 – a loss of 20%.

After seeing our online advert she contacted Goodwin Barrett to see if we could help. We discovered she had been advised to invest into the UK Growth Fund which meant her investment was solely reliant on how the stock market performed. This was too high in risk for someone having never invested before and we sent our claim to Halifax explaining so.

Halifax investigated the advice they had given to Mrs Armstrong and agreed that it was not suitable for her at that time. They paid her £2,302 to settle the claim in accordance with regulatory guidelines.