Property Investment Decision Reference 2022-0386

• Case Outcome: Rejected
• Subject Matter: Property Investment
• Reference: 2022-0386
• Date: 08 December 2022
• Finantial Sector: Investment
• Conducts Complained Of: Mis-selling (investment),Dissatisfaction with final fund value , Failure to consider suitability , Failure to provide warning re. Nature of investment , Misrepresentation (at point of sale or after), Mis-selling, Product not suitable , Value of policy a

Decision Ref:

2022-0386

Sector:

Investment

Product / Service:

Property Investment

Conduct(s) complained of:

Mis-selling (investment)

Failure to provide warning re. Nature of investment

Misrepresentation (at point of sale or after)

Mis-selling

Failure to consider suitability

Value of policy at surrender less than expected or

projected

Product not suitable

Dissatisfaction with final fund value

Outcome:

Rejected

LEGALLY BINDING DECISION OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND PENSIONS OMBUDSMAN

In or about May 2007, the Complainant was introduced to a tied agent of the Provider by

the Complainant’s Bank (a separate legal entity within the same group of companies) and

the discussions led to the Complainant investing €125,000 with the Provider, in a UK

geared property fund.

- 2 -

/Cont’d…

The Complainant did so by entering into a ‘Syndicated Property Portfolio Policy’ which was

a life assurance-based investment policy (the “Investment Policy”) supplied by the

Provider, through which the investment in the geared UK property fund was effected.

The Complainant states that in March 2013, he was advised that the investment has

“collapsed and was now worthless”.

This complaint arises out of the conduct of the Provider in its dealings with the

Complainant, following the introduction of the Complainant to the Provider’s tied agent by

an employee of the Complainant’s bank.

An assessment of the jurisdiction of this Office to investigate this complaint was carried

out, and this Office concluded by way of Final Jurisdictional Determination on 2 April 2020,

that this complaint was made within the applicable statutory time limits.

The Complainant’s Case

The Complainant says that he is a single man with no dependents. He says that in 2006, he

and his brother sold the property from which they had previous traded.

After having dealt with the costs of sale and taxation following the sale of the property,

the Complainant says he deposited the balance of approximately €980,000 in the branch

of his Bank, where he held his account.

The Complainant, in his submissions to this Office, says that having sold the property

mentioned above, his only source of income was what he derives from the proceeds of the

sale of that property. He describes these sale proceeds as “effectively his pension”. He also

explains that he had no previous experience of investments of this nature, and that he left

school at an early age, and worked all his life in manual labour, in particular in the

operation of equipment such as forklifts and teleporters.

The Complainant says that within a month of the Complainant lodging the proceeds of his

property sale, to his account, a Bank representative, Mr R, approached him in a pub about

investing in the Provider’s property portfolio, and created very high expectations in

relation to potential returns, by referencing outstanding returns achieved in a Paris

project.

The Complainant says that Mr R subsequently met him on a few occasions by chance, in

the pub and that on each occasion the topic of conversation was investment; in March

2007, again at the local pub, Mr R informed the Complainant about a new exciting

investment prospect in the UK. The Complainant says Mr R assured him that the

investment was safe, describing it as “gold plated”. The Complainant says that after

several calls with Mr R, he felt pressured into investing €125,000 into a UK geared property

fund, and that Mr R arranged for him to meet the Provider’s tied agent in late March 2007,

to sign forms.