Hi everyone,
Sorry it’s taken so long for us to get to this. By way of intro, I’m the new(ish) Head of Product - Pensions.
To answer the original question: yes InvestEngine support in-specie transfer out for ISA and SIPP wrappers, with a few conditions that the wider industry generally deal with.
For GIA wrappers, we generally only undertake in-specie transfers when an account has grown enough to generate tax implications.
You can be assured that any investment you make with InvestEngine can be securely transferred out at anytime in line with industry standards.
In more detail… The conditions on in-specie transfer out are that InvestEngine can complete these: a) for whole integer ETFs; b) where the new provider will accept the specific ETF; and c) when a complete wrapper account (ISA or SIPP) is requested to be transferred.
For partial wrapper account transfers, those ETFs the new provider won’t accept and any fractional ETFs, these must be sold down and transferred as cash.
Building automation to help us deliver partial wrapper account transfers is on our roadmap. But this is a feature very few other providers offer it in the UK, and we are balancing trade-offs between a number of customer-centric improvements across the business. So while I’d love to say it will be done by a certain date, we haven’t made these prioritisation decisions yet.
The reason we held off replying in the thread confirming we do allow for in-specie transfers out, is that, like every investment and pension platform in the run up to tax year end, our operations team was (and continues to be) working overtime to deliver on the surge in requests.
Our highest priority will always be making sure we action these requests correctly each and every time.
I hope this is all clear and I’m more than keen to continue this or any other discussion. Engaged investors are the backbone of InvestEngine’s success, so if anyone has any further thoughts or questions, please reach out.