Towry transfer delays cost Ascentric £15k per month

Wrap platform Ascentric has said delays over the transfer of assets from Towry is costing it £15,000 per month.

Ascentric managing director Hugo Thorman (pictured) said the platform was waiting for £75 million of assets to be transferred, and that it had seen no change in pace despite Towry devoting a 10-strong team to tackling the problem.

Towry maintains it will clear the asset transfer backlog from the acquisition of Edward Jones shortly.

Thorman said most transfers had been requested in March 2010.

Thorman said the delays were hurting clients. ‘The clients are getting a group together to lobby the FSA, and I think if the clients have got to that point its only right to support. It’s been a long time. It’s not good for clients or the advisers,’ he said.

‘We got a lot of grief from advisers because they initially thought we had something to do with it.’

Thorman added a significant number of former Edward Jones advisers had asked to move assets on to Ascentric.

Andrew Fisher,Towry chief executive, said Towry would deliver on its pledge to sort out the transfer backlog.

‘It will be completed by the end of the month. All the responsibility Towry has will have been executed. It will then take some of the platforms more time to deal with that, but there’s nothing we can do about that,’ he said.

Fisher added that there had been 9,000 requests to transfer assets onto platforms in the last six months.