Providence Avis 

Similar experience to what has been listed below by many others.
Marketing fees taken and back dated several years without any explanation.
The formal complaint I made was treated very slowly and then just batted away.
This is on top of losing all money in one of the investments in the fund which was reduced to zero.
Without doubt the worst investment decision I have ever made on every level.
Also very disappointed with the lack of interest shown by De Vere Customer Services

I have indeed sent a complaint that was dealt with in an unprofessional, disinterested manner

Update on marketing fees - It is now established and recorded in writing that 1) DeVeres were unaware of any marketing fees at time of sale of the PLL policy 2) DeVeres confirm the brochure and T&C used by them to sell the product and attached at time of application are different to those issued by PLL in final documents and used as basis of fee deductions 3) Trustee confirms in writing that they were unaware of any marketing fees and that they will be pursuing PLL themselves through various complaint and potential legal procedures.

Overview Notes made by PLL that all marketing fees have been investigated and explained are incorrect and their view on the subject only.

Complaint has been raised to Mauritius Regulatory Body.

Note : Lots of amazing reviews for company over last 6 weeks only (some by what appear to be IFAs) is this to counter the poor reviews regarding the rather disturbing retrospective deductions?

I won't repeat everything that has already been well documented here, but as Mr Hopkins has already clearly explained I have also been impacted by a marketing fee which was not at all mentioned in the contract I signed back in 2012. This marketing fee which was a substantial amount of my investment was just taken out of my account without any authorisation in Nov 2021. Since then I have been trying to retrieve this money via my financial advisor in Devere and my Trustees at STM, so far without success. This has completely dented my trust in this company and effectively ruined my retirement plan for the foreseeable future. Considering the number of complaints now building against Providence life I would highly recommend they sort out these serious complaints very quickly before the situation becomes any worse for their longer term reputation.

Cannot fault providence in any way, everything about my policy is straightforward and would be very happy to recommend

The atmosphere working with the company is great! Clear communication as always and the Management is very assistive to the clients, especially during the pandemic. Thank you all for the support.

Excellent service and very responsive!

The savings and portfolio products offered by Providence are highly competetive and essential in the Latam area, i have had nothing but a great experiance from the admisinstration team, always responding to queries in a timely manner.

This is a good company to work with. Management is very helpful and provided excellent support in covid times.

As a Mexican living abroad, I was lucky to find this option to be my international pension replacement.
I’ve had the regular savings plan for over two years and I find the account pretty useful. An easy way to dollar-cost-average on different funds.
Many of my close friends also got the same account for them.

I’ve been a Providence client for 4 years, and have a Compass policy. I am also a deVere adviser, so as well as having a policy of my own, I have also recommended Providence to many of my clients. The service from Providence has always been great, and any small issues are resolved very quickly with minimum fuss. My own policy is growing well, I’m investing on a monthly basis and it’s a 25 year policy. I would recommend Providence for anyone looking to save and grow their money in the long-term.

I would agree with everything here but also add in the lack of duty of care by companies such as De Vere who are not willing to do anything to look after their clients. They seemed to have no knowledge of what was happening and will not put any pressure on Providence to explain or reverse the fee. If De Vere were marketing a policy without the full information, then I believe that they must share some of the responsibility - even if they were misled by Providence. I trusted their judgment in offering me a "low fee" policy. When it turned out that this was untrue, then some of the fault should also be theirs. De Vere should have had all the information available at the policy inception. To my mind, this is a case of mis-selling. I will be going down the trustee and regulator route but will also bring in the ombudsman to investigate De Vere if they do not make some efforts to find out what they did wrong.

This quote is from De Vere's own website. "We all want to enjoy a fulfilling, life-enriching retirement that’s free from avoidable money worries." Well, they have certainly failed on that score!

Has anyone had any joy from their pension provider in getting help with this?

Similar to many here, Providence Life have stolen a large portion of my pension pot too. I do consider it stolen, as I never signed any form of contract allowing these fees to be taken. Is there any way we can start a class action suit?

I have also been affected by this Marketing fee issue and I am still waiting on someone to give me a breakdown of how the Marketing fee was calculated. The fact that they also took the money without any authorisation is extremely suspicious.

As others mention. Marketing fee 8% was not deducted. They want an extra 50% because that’s how the fund has performed since I started managing the portfolio. A joke. Disgraceful. Amount was deducted without permission based on a spurious calculation. Would they ask for less if the fund had fallen in value? I think not. Avoid and avoid anyone associated with them

Same as others have commented. PLL made an error on my statement for 5 years by not deducting the 1% "marketing fee". It was only when i tried to close my account they claimed to realize the mistake.
The "marketing fee" runs for 8 years and is 1% of the fund, so because they failed to take it for the first 5 years they want to take it for the next 8 years, meaning i am trapped in the pension for another 8 years. Unless i want to pay 8% of the fund value, plus interest on all 8 years, although the fund is only 5 years old. Yes PLL want to profit from the mistake they have made.
Now the 8% Marketing fee is the amount they pay the broker for selling your fund to them and you have to pay it back. Not that they will tell you this, but this is the case.
To not realize this mistake with the Marketing Fee for 5 years + is more than a little suspicious. How did they not realize it. This would of been picked up any time someone wanted to withdraw from their fund. They are suggesting nobody withdrew money from their accounts in the past 5 years so the mistake wasn't noticed. Its my opinion this has to be a deliberate error in an attempt to profit by ensuring their clients remain trapped in a fund that charges huge fee's. So instead of paying fee's for 8 years i am trapped and have to pay fee's for 13 years. In reality this is a scam but a legalized scam.
After transferring my pension from the UK to PLL i am approximately 30k worse off that i would of bee if i had not made the move, this is all down to the huge fee's they charge.
I have now logged a complaint with the Mauritius FCA.
Responding to PLL comments.
Just because you have explained why you have deducted a large sum from my account, doesn't justify it. The contract says you would charge 8% of the initial contract value. You actually took 8% of the final value which was 50% more than you are entitled to. Because you know there is nothing i/we can do about this, you proceeded with impunity.
The issue with the Marketing fee was never a mistake, it was calculated plan to fleece your clients.

Charging for marketing costs many years later is not acceptable. The authorities must look into this because there are serious reputational issues for the juristiction.