Adviser accuses Scottish Widows of sharing client info | Money Marketing (2024)

An adviser has accused Scottish Widows of attempting to steal business by passing on a client’s details to third parties.

Independent Personal Financial Management director Luke Gibbon says Scottish Widows shared client details with Halifax and Lloyds Bank without his knowledge.

Scottish Widows, Halifax and Lloyds Bank are all subsidiaries of Lloyds Banking Group.

Gibbon says it came to light as he has a client with Scottish Widows pensions and when her husband died, she wanted to cancel her Halifax credit card.

He says Halifax came back to her with a list of all the policies she had with the group, including the Scottish Widows pensions.

He adds Halifax wrote to her and said a member of their bereavement team will contact to help her with pensions.

Gibbon made an official complaint to Scottish Widows about sharing policy numbers but widened it after he realised full plan details are available to Halifax and Lloyds Bank staff.

He points out this case is particularly complex, partly due to the size of the estate, but also because the clients were in the process of moving when the husband died.

Gibbon says he has expressed this concern to the family and worries Lloyds Banking Group could easily do something that makes things more complicated.

He adds the deceased did not have any business with Lloyds Bank.

Money Marketing has seen two responses from Scottish Widows that explain the provider’s line on sharing client details with other members of its financial group.

The complaint manager who has written the longer response to Gibbon says: “I cannot agree that we are providing your clients or any other of our customer’s with advice and trying to take business away from an independent financial adviser as our bereavement team are not qualified to provide advice and would only be able to give information about the products held. To reiterate our data privacy notice allows us to share information within the group when meeting a legitimate interest for our customers.”

It adds customer information can be “lawfully shared” in “certain circ*mstances” where “we believe it is necessary to meet a legitimate interest for our customers”.

Regarding the responses he has received, Gibbon says: “These two responses from Scottish Widows both claim it is perfectly acceptable to share IFA’s clients details with Halifax and Lloyds Bank and effectively with Schroders Personal Wealth Financial planning.

“All of these companies offer investments into general investment account and Isas and pension plans both before and after retirement. Therefore, we are effectively giving the data of our clients to our competitors. Scottish Widows in conjunction with Lloyds have reached this decision without any consultation of the IFA market.”

He adds: “In the response from Scottish Widows they state that it is clearly better for the client if the bereavement team are able to provide details of all products the deceased held.

“I completely disagree with this as it is clearly labelled that his pensions are administered by an IFA and the bereavement team could have contacted me if they wanted to. I am not looking for compensation but changes to the system and to raise this issue for other advisers if they are not aware of it.”

In response a spokeswoman for Lloyds Banking Group says: “We have a ‘tell us once’ service to make it quicker and easier for anyone who’s suffered a bereavement, taking away the stress of having to notify each business within our group individually. It’s wrong to suggest that this service is used for anything other than helping customers who are dealing with the loss of a family member.”

Money Marketing understands Lloyds Banking Group asks permission from a deceased’s legal representative to provide notification of death to any other member of Lloyds Banking Group for administration purposes.

Schroders Personal Wealth and Cazenove Capital are separate entities to Lloyds Banking Group – they do not have access to Scottish Widows customer data, Money Marketing gathers.

Comments

1. 

   Justin Side19th December 2019 at 10:47 am

   Bereavement is a terrible thing and if the bank makes it easier for the family to deal with matters by only having to go through the notification process once, then this should be applauded.

   The adviser should be ashamed and put his client first, not his own interests.

   If he is providing a quality service, the client will thank him, not run off with the bank.

   Unbelieavable attitude.

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