Touch by AJ Bell terms and conditions

Introduction to these Terms

These Terms apply to all Services that Touch provides to you. They are made up of the following 4 sections: Introduction to these Terms, General terms, How we execute your trades and Glossary. If you open a Stocks and shares ISA or Retirement Investment Account, additional terms apply, which are set out in the appendices to these Terms.

These Terms form part of the Agreement between you and us, so you should read them in full before opening an Account. These Terms will apply in the event of any inconsistency with the other terms of the Agreement. Once the Agreement has started it won’t end until you or we end it.

About Touch

Touch is a part of the AJ Bell group. The products and services set out in these Terms are provided by the following AJ Bell companies:

• AJ Bell Securities Limited, (authorised and regulated by the FCA with registration number 155593), which provides the dealing and custody services for your investments and acts as ISA Manager for the Stocks and Shares ISA;
• AJ Bell Management Limited (authorised and regulated by the FCA with registration number 211468), which acts as the administrator of the Scheme and provides administration services in relation to your RIA;
• Sippdeal Trustees Limited, which acts as the trustee of the Scheme;
• Lawshare Nominees Limited, which is the Nominee for your investments; and
• AJ Bell Asset Management Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the FCA with registration number 774048 and acts as the investment manager for the AJ Bell funds included in the range of Permitted Investments.

The registered office of all AJ Bell companies is: 4 Exchange Quay, Salford Quays, Manchester M5 3EE.

Any reference in these Terms to Touch, we, us or our is a reference to the AJ Bell company which provides the relevant Services.

Your relationship with Touch

Our role is to act on instructions from you, which includes acting on instructions initiated by your adviser which you have approved. We don’t provide financial, investment or tax advice and we don’t assess the suitability or appropriateness for you of your Accounts, or the investments held within your Accounts. This is your adviser’s responsibility. Please always carry out your own research and contact your adviser for advice where needed.

General terms

1. Becoming a customer

You can only open an Account if you are aged over 18 and solely a UK resident for tax purposes.

To open an Account, your adviser will need to initiate an Application for you to review and approve via the App. When you approve your Application via the App, we’ll ask you to complete an identity check. Once the identity check is successfully complete, your Agreement with us will start and you’ll have access to your Account. We may decline your Application entirely at our discretion.

You can only have one type of each Account offered by Touch.

You must tell us and your adviser straightaway if you move abroad or if you become a resident of anywhere other than the UK for tax purposes. If you hold a General Investment Account and you move abroad, we may close your Account but would normally only do so if your new country of residence means we have to perform any activities that do not fall within the normal scope of the Services. You’ll also need to talk to your adviser about any changes to your tax position and personal circumstances.

You will be classed as a retail customer for the purposes of the FCA rules. This classification provides you with the highest level of available protection.

You are responsible for dealing with your tax affairs, including completing and submitting all tax returns relevant to your personal circumstances and, if applicable, paying any tax liability that arises. You are also responsible for checking that any information we provide you with about your investments, which is used for the purposes of completing any tax returns (e.g. details of dividend receipts and capital gains), is accurate and complete. We are not responsible for any personal tax liability you may have in relation to your Account.

For each of your Accounts, you are contracting directly and separately with each of AJ Bell Management Limited and AJ Bell Securities Limited for the Services they each provide in relation to your Account. Subject to these Terms, AJ Bell Securities Limited is responsible for the Nominee and AJ Bell Management Limited is responsible for the Trustee.

2. Your adviser

You can only use our Services if you have an adviser who is authorised by the FCA to provide financial advice and registered with us as an adviser. We are not responsible for any of the activities that fall within the scope of your adviser’s responsibility as your financial adviser.

If you no longer have an adviser, you’ll need to appoint another one, close your Account or transfer your Account to another product which is suitable for individuals who do not have an adviser. We’re not able to accept instructions on your Account while you don’t have a registered adviser, other than for existing regular payments or withdrawal requests.

3. Using the App

App terms of use

It is your responsibility to keep your device, PIN and security details safe at all times. You should let us know immediately if you suspect fraudulent activity on your Account, or if you’ve lost your device. If you’ve lost access to your Account, no longer have a valid email address, or see any transactions in the App you’re unsure about, you should let us know as soon as possible.

We do not guarantee that all features in the App will work as expected on older operating systems and important information or tasks may not show. You’re responsible for making sure your mobile device can support the App (which we’ll update from time to time). The App may not be supported by your mobile device.

If you send a message to your adviser via the App, their response may be delayed, especially outside of usual office hours, if your request is urgent, contact your adviser directly.

We’ll try to make any updates to the App outside of usual trading hours. Sometimes you may experience occasional interruption to our Services because of routine or non-routine maintenance.

If we find any security issues affecting your Account, we’ll contact you as soon as possible. We’ll block your Account if we suspect any criminal activity.

Instructions, investment proposals, summary documents and tasks

Your adviser is responsible for initiating and submitting instructions on your Account. Every instruction submitted by your adviser will be sent to you for approval via the App. You will also have the option to decline the instruction and provide comments to your adviser. Once you approve an instruction it cannot be withdrawn or amended (unless expressly stated otherwise).

Each time your adviser submits an instruction on your Account, we will make it available to you in the App for you to review and approve, in the form of:

• an Investment Proposal – this sets out details of your adviser’s initial instruction in respect of your Account, including the funds your adviser has recommended to suit your investment objectives, initial and ad hoc investments, Transfers, Deposits and withdrawals and the related Charges; or
• a Summary document – this sets out details of subsequent instructions from your adviser for you to approve. The instruction may relate to any aspect of your Account, including, Deposits, withdrawals, transfers between Accounts, transfers from external providers, trades or Charges.

Instructions will be accompanied by a link to the applicable KIID (Key Investor Information Documents) or illustrations which you’ll be asked to confirm you’ve read before approving the instruction.

We’ll send you a push notification when you have a new task to complete on the App. You will need to log in to the App to manage and respond to your tasks. It is your responsibility to ensure you: (i) have push notifications enabled on your mobile device, (ii) read your investment proposals, summary documents, messages from us and your adviser and (iii) respond to tasks and notifications within any timeframes provided.

We will only act on instructions directly from you or instructions which you have approved.

Reports, statements and other documents

We will provide you with (i) quarterly statements, setting out information about the investments held in your Account, and (ii) annual statements, setting out details of the costs and charges associated with the investments held in your Account.

You can find information on all your transactions and contract notes for trades in the transactions section of the App. You can also see previous trading instructions from your adviser, statements and reports in the document store within the App.

If you have a General Investment Account, we’ll send an annual consolidated tax voucher via the App, which will set out the details of gains and losses with respect to your investments and any dividend and other income payments you have received in the tax year, which will help you to complete your tax return.

Except as stated in the Appendix for your Stock and Shares ISA, we do not provide company reports or accounts for the investments you hold in your Account or arrange for you to attend company meetings.

4. Deposits and Transfers into your Account

Cash Deposits

Deposits can only be made in cash, by electronic bank transfer in GBP and from a UK bank account held in your name (either solely or jointly). We do not allow one off deposits of more than £500,000. We do not accept cheques and any cheques will be returned to the address we have recorded for you.

When we receive cash from you, we’ll allocate this to your Account as soon as we have matched the payment to you. When sending money to us, we’ll ask you to use a reference so we can easily identify it. If you forget to add the correct reference, your Deposit won’t be lost but there may be a delay in you seeing it in your Account. We will refund the Deposit if we cannot match any payment to you within 10 Business Days.

Your Deposit will typically be available for use immediately (although it may take up to 2 hours). If cash is made available for your use before it has cleared but it then does not clear, we will adjust the cash balance in your Account accordingly.

If a Deposit is made to your Account in error or if we are unable to satisfactorily verify the source of any Deposit we receive, we will refund that payment to the account if came from without your authority. We reserve the right to only refund the Deposit to the same bank account which the Deposit came from once it has cleared and notify you of the correction. If investments are sold as a result of correcting a Deposit made in error, the refunded amount may be less than the amount of the original Deposit due to the effect of stock market movements in price and associated Charges.

We may decline any Deposit entirely at our discretion but would normally only do this if we cannot verify the source of the Deposit. We’ll always tell you why a Deposit has been refused unless Regulatory Requirements prevent us (e.g. in the case of fraud).

Any amount refunded may be less than the amount you paid in because of the relevant Charges, the performance of your investments or tax, charges or interest applied by HMRC.

Regular payments

A regular payment is a type of Deposit which is linked to an instruction to trade a specific investment for the same value and at the same frequency as the regular payment. Your adviser can initiate a regular payment instruction for you to approve via the App.

We don’t allow regular monthly payments of more than £20,000 for a specific investment.

Regular payments will only be collected after your bank account has been verified. If this falls after the cut-off time for monthly collections, your instruction will begin the next month after your bank account has been verified. Cut-off dates for collections are 20th of the month, or if applicable, the next Business Day.

It may take up to 5 Business Days before regular payments made into your Account are available for use.

If your bank declines or recalls a regular payment, we’ll block the regular payments instruction until we receive a new instruction to amend or cancel it.

Transfers

We only accept Transfers from other providers to your Account where you are transferring the full value of the account held with that provider.

• If your transfer is in cash, we’ll accept the electronic Transfer of cash from your transferring provider. We do not accept cheques and any cheques will be returned and the cash transfer will be requested electronically.
• If your transfer is of investments, we’ll request details of your investments from your transferring provider who may convert the fund into a share class that we both hold, which may be more expensive. We’ll convert any funds to a cheaper share class where one is available.

You and your adviser are responsible for initiating any Transfer to your Account and providing any other information required by us to facilitate the Transfer.

When you transfer investments, the applicable charges, including our custody charges, will accrue from the date that we receive the investment and will be deducted when the total transfer has been completed and there is available cash in the account.

5. Your cash

All cash can only be held in GBP.

We will hold cash in pooled bank accounts with one or more banks and we’ll keep it separate from any cash belonging to us. All pooled bank accounts are accounts held in our name but the bank acknowledges that we are holding the cash for customers and the bank agrees that it does not have any rights to any cash in the event that we owe any money to the bank or any third party.

Except in the case of cash held in respect of an RIA, all cash is held by AJ Bell Securities Limited as client money (as defined by the FCA), which means that it is protected by the FCA’s client money rules and guidance.

Cash held in respect of an RIA will be held by AJ Bell Securities Limited at the direction of AJ Bell Management Limited (who is the scheme administrator for the Scheme) and held as client money. If at any time cash held in your RIA is no longer required for investment purposes, it may be transferred to an account held in the name of Sippdeal Trustees Limited (the trustee for the Scheme). Where your cash is held by Sippdeal Trustees Limited, it is protected by being held on trust in accordance with the Scheme Rules, and not as client money.

We use a range of banks to mitigate the risk of a bank’s failure. We will not be responsible for the failure or default of a bank where we hold your cash. In the event of a bank’s failure, your claim will be for a share of the cash held in all pooled bank accounts at that bank. You may also be able to claim against the FSCS (see section 18 for information on the FSCS).

We may place cash held as client money on deposit, for a fixed term which does not exceed 95 days, or in a notice account where the notice does not exceed 95 days. We do this so we are able to place deposits with a wider range of banks in order to reduce your exposure to the risk of a bank failure and to obtain better interest rates on the deposits, which helps us to keep our Charges low.

Placing cash on a fixed term deposit or in a notice account means that cash cannot be withdrawn until the end of the relevant fixed term or notice period, potentially delaying access to this cash in the event of significantly increased demand for withdrawals. However, we manage all cash we hold to ensure there is enough available to satisfy customer demand, which means that your ability to withdraw cash from your Account should not be affected. In the event of our or a bank’s failure, but it may mean that cash is not immediately available for distribution.

6. Your investments

You can only hold Permitted Investments in your Account. We can change the Permitted Investments at our discretion and at any time. If an investment in your Account is no longer a Permitted Investment, you will need to sell or transfer it to another provider.

Your investments will be held in a pooled investment account in the name of the Nominee. You should note that in the event of the failure of the Nominee, your claim will be for a share of the investments pooled.

We are responsible for the acts and omissions of the Nominee to the same extent that we are responsible for our own acts or omissions, but will not (in the absence of fraud or wilful default) be responsible for the acts and omissions of any sub-nominee, custodian, sub-custodian, securities depository, intermediate broker or agent, clearing or settlement system or participant in such a system.

All investments held in your GIA and ISA Accounts must remain in your beneficial ownership, except to the extent necessary to allow your trades to be placed and executed. This means that you hold the underlying right to ownership of an investment, so you will not otherwise be able to sell the investment, use it as security for a loan or otherwise deal with it.

7. Charges

Charging structure

Full details on the Charges can be found on the Website. The amount of our Charges, as well as the nature of our Charges, may change from time to time. All charges exclude VAT (unless stated otherwise), which is payable by you.

The Charges for the Services generally fall within one of the following categories:

• Custody charges – These are the charges made by us for providing investment custody and administration services. You’ll find details set out in the investment proposal and summary documents shared with you via the App for approval.
• Adviser charges – These are the charges agreed with your adviser for their services. We’ll only collect adviser charges which you have approved via the App. Initial charges are deducted as a single payment when a new Deposit is received or once a Transfer is complete. Ad-hoc charges are deducted as a single payment as soon as you have approved them. Ongoing charges are deducted on a monthly basis.

Once cash has been deducted from your Account to pay adviser charges, it will no longer be held as client money, but will be held in a corporate bank account until we pay them to your adviser. If you tell us that you no longer have an adviser or that you have withdrawn consent for an ongoing adviser charge, we’ll stop collecting the adviser charges from the date you tell us, but may not be able to stop any charges that are already in flight, in which case you will need to speak to your adviser.

Details of any adviser charges taken from your Account can be found in the transactions page of the App and in your quarterly statement.

• Product charges – each investment you hold in your Account will have its own management and administration charges, taxes or other costs, which are outside our control and not charged or payable by us. Your adviser is responsible for informing you about these and details will be included in the investment proposal or summary document that is sent to you via the App for approval.

You authorise us to deduct all Charges from your Account when they are due.

Your adviser is responsible for ensuring that you have enough cash in your Account to pay all Charges.

Our ability to sell your investments and make deductions

We may deduct cash from your Account and/or sell any of your investments to realise cash if we or your adviser are owed money from your Account (including any Charges which we have been unable, or have omitted, to deduct previously). This will be an automatic process unless you have approved an alternative instruction from your adviser via the App. If you approve the alternative instruction after our automatic process has started, we sell more of your investments than is required for the deduction, in which case the excess cash will remain in your Account. If we are unable to realise enough cash by selling your investments, you will be personally responsible to us for any shortfall in the Charges.

If we fail to deduct all or part of any Charges from your Account on the date they are due, we may deduct them later.

8. Withdrawals

Withdrawals can only be made from your Account in GBP.

If you want to make a withdrawal from your Account you can start the process with us directly through the App, or by contacting your adviser. We won’t charge you to withdraw cash from your Account.

If you submit an instruction to sell and withdraw 95% or more of the value of an investment, we’ll automatically treat this as an instruction to sell and withdraw the whole value. This is in order to ensure that that the trade can still be actioned in the event of a negative price movement.

Withdrawals are paid into your nominated bank account at the time your instruction is confirmed. Your nominated bank account must be based in the UK and held in your name (either solely or jointly). We will only accept details of your nominated bank account directly from you. For security purposes, we will only pay withdrawals to your linked bank account and only once we have verified its authenticity to our satisfaction.

You can change your nominated bank account at any time, but there may be a delay whilst we check your new bank details. We are not responsible to you for any delay as a result of this.

We’ll make payments to you in GBP by electronic bank transfer. We will use the Faster Payments Service to send your payments where possible. This service reduces payment times to you.

If you withdraw cash (in whole or part) within 120 days from opening your Account, we’ll have the option to return it to the bank account it came from.

If the withdrawal involves the sale of an investment, it will typically take no longer than 8 Business Days. If the sale relates to an investment that has been suspended, we will not be able to process your instruction until the suspension has lifted but will do so within a reasonable period of time from the end of the suspension.

We may delay payment of a withdrawal if we think it could be fraudulent or involved in any sort of criminal activity.

9. Transfers Out

You can only Transfer Out the full value of your Account to another provider.

If you instruct a Transfer Out in cash, we’ll sell your investments and transfer the cash in your Account to your new provider.

If you want to Transfer Out your investments without converting them to cash and your new provider is able to hold your existing investments, we can arrange for them to be transferred without being sold. When transferring your investments in this way, we may convert your existing funds to a fund share class that can be held by both us and your new provider. In some cases, this may be more expensive than the fund you already hold. If your new provider is not able to hold your existing investments, we’ll sell your investments and transfer the cash in your Account to your new provider.

We won’t charge you for transferring your investments to another provider. If you want to transfer your Account to another provider, please speak to your adviser.

We’ll make transfers within a reasonable time frame and as efficiently as we can. If the transfer out relates to an investment that has been suspended, we will transfer it within a reasonable period of time from the end of the suspension.

All Charges will continue to apply until the Transfer Out is complete and they will be deducted from your Account in accordance with these Terms.

Once you approve an instruction from your adviser to transfer out, we won’t accept any more instructions for your Account.

10. Our use of your information

You agree to us keeping, using and storing your personal information in connection with the provision of the Services to you, both during the relationship and after it has ended for as long as it is legal, appropriate and necessary to do so, including for the provision of marketing and investment information if you’ve opted to receive it. We’ll only use your personal information where we have lawful grounds for doing so. You can find more information on how we handle your personal information in our privacy policy, which can be found on our Website.

You acknowledge that we may record any electronic communications that we have with you (including by telephone or via the App or email) for quality assurance, training and regulatory purposes. These records will belong to us and we will store them both during the relationship and after it has ended for as long as it is legal, appropriate and necessary to do so.

11. How we communicate with you

We’ll always communicate with you in English.

Touch is app-only, which means that we will contact you primarily via the App or by email. In some instances we may also communicate with you by phone or by post to your home address. You are responsible for checking the App and your email regularly for communications from us.

We recommend that you always have push notifications enabled on the mobile device you use to access the App to ensure that you do not miss important information regarding your Account. We are not responsible for any information you miss if you do not have push notifications enabled.

It is your responsibility to ensure we have the correct contact details for you and you must let us and your adviser know as soon as possible if your contact information changes. You must have a valid mobile phone number and email address in order to use Touch.

In some circumstances we may require original documents to be sent to us. You and your adviser are responsible for taking reasonable steps to ensure this information is sent to us securely.

12. Cancellation

You can cancel your Account within 30 days from the date that your Account is open. We will return any cash we hold to you and any investments can either be sold or transferred into your name or to another account held in your name.

You can cancel a Transfer to your RIA or Stocks and Shares ISA within 30 days from the date when we confirm that a Transfer has been completed. We will return all cash and/or investments we receive to the previous pension provider or ISA Manager (as applicable). If they will not accept their return on the terms which applied prior to the transfer, we will contact your adviser for them to initiate the provision of further instructions to us. If you have not approved an instruction within the cancellation period, we reserve the right to take reasonable administration charges from your Account until we make the transfer to another pension provider or ISA Manager (as applicable).

However, if you place a trade within the cancellation period for your RIA, you will waive your cancellation rights, which means that you are no longer able to cancel your RIA or any Transfer to your RIA. You can also voluntarily lapse your cancellation rights by contacting us directly to confirm the same, or by approving an instruction from your adviser in the App.

If you decide to cancel, you’ll need to contact us (directly or by approving an instruction from your adviser in the App) and provide your name, Account reference number and confirmation that you wish to cancel your Account or a Transfer to your Account (as applicable).

If investments are sold as a result of implementing your cancellation request, you may get back less than the amount you originally invested due to the effect of stock market movements in price and associated Charges.

Any amount repaid to you may have had your adviser’s charges deducted, and you’ll need to contact your adviser to arrange any refund.

13. Closing or freezing your Account

You can contact us and ask for your Account to be closed at any time.

We can close or freeze your Account at any time by giving you and/or your adviser 30 days’ notice. We can close or freeze your Account immediately if we suspect fraudulent or criminal activity, or reasonably believe that you’ve:

• broken these Terms or abused our Services
• put us in a position where we might break the law
• broken the law or attempted to break the law
• given us false information at any time
• had a change in circumstances which means you’re no longer eligible for an Account (like moving abroad)
• given a third party control of your Account, phone, or PIN (unless you’ve formally agreed this with us); or
• been abusive to any of our staff

If we close or freeze your Account, we may sell your investments and hold cash in your Account until you give us instructions (or you approve your adviser’s instructions) to transfer out or withdraw (as applicable) the cash from your Account.

The closure of your Account will not impact any trades that are already in progress. Once complete, we’ll then sell your investments and pay the cash to you or transfer to your requested provider.

If your Account is closed, you will still have access to review your documents for 6 years from the date of closure.

If we consider that you’re not using your Account and there are no investments or cash held in the Account (or there is a minimal cash balance left in the Account), we may close your Account and send you any remaining cash balance after deducting any amounts that are due to us and any tax due to HMRC. We will give you or your adviser at least 7 days’ notice before we take any action.

If we delay or fail to exercise any of our rights or remedies, it will not prevent us from doing so at a later time.

14. Death

We’ll maintain your cash and investments (including income that is received after your death) until we’ve received your executors or personal representatives’ instructions. These Terms will apply equally to them and the Charges will continue to accrue after your death until your Account is closed.

Your executor or personal representatives will need to demonstrate to our satisfaction that they have the legal power to provide instructions.

15. Our responsibilities to you

As we aim to provide a high standard of service to you at a reasonable cost, we limit our legal responsibility to you on the basis set out in these Terms.

We will only be legally responsible to you for any foreseeable loss if it has been caused by our (i) negligence, which means we’ve failed to follow a duty of care that we may have to you, (ii) fraud or (iii) if we’ve intentionally breached these Terms. Foreseeable loss means that we could or should have expected you to suffer the Loss in the circumstances.

We’re not responsible to you for:

• any personal financial advice, loss of profit, loss of opportunity to invest or disinvest or any wasted expenditure;
• any indirect Loss;
• Loss arising from delays in the Services where this is not reasonably our fault, including executing your instructions and trades, processing Deposits, Transfers, Transfers Out or withdrawals;
• any loss that you are responsible for or which arises as a result of your breach of these Terms;
• anything done or omitted to be done by your adviser.

In addition, we’re not responsible to you for any Loss arising from events beyond our reasonable control. This may include:

• problems with any networks or systems, equipment or software used by us or a third party we use to help provide the Services;
• actions or decisions taken to comply with legal or regulatory requirements;
• problems with any clearing system we use or the failure by any settlement bank to make, receive or debit any payment;
• Loss arising from a third party, investment manager or bank; and
• any malicious act of any third party.

For market or trading loss our total responsibility to you (including in the case of adverse price movements, any claim for loss of the ability or delay in disinvestment, or in the case of favourable price movements, the loss of the opportunity to or delay in investment), is limited to the greater of:

• £500 and the total amount of the Charges you paid to us in the 12 months’ immediately preceding the event which gave rise to your claim for market or trading loss (or, if your Account has been open for less than 12 months, such amount as you would have paid on a pro rata basis); and
• interest at a rate of 8% per year (or such other rate as the Financial Services Ombudsman is likely to apply to awards) on the principal amount in respect of which the loss occurs for the duration of your claim.

We may engage third party service providers to provide any of the Services. We will exercise reasonable skill and care when selecting, monitoring and periodically reviewing any third party service providers we engage but will not otherwise be responsible for their default or other acts or omissions.

These Terms don’t exclude or limit our liability to you where it’s against the law for us to do so.

The provisions set out in this section will continue to apply even if we stop supplying you with the Services. The provisions set out in this section apply to us and our Group companies in connection with any liability under the Agreement.

16. Conflicts of interest

Conflicts of interest may arise between us or between you and another customer. We’ve implemented a conflicts policy, which is available on the Website and explains how conflicts can arise and the arrangements we have for managing them.

17. If things go wrong

If you have a complaint, please contact us. We’ll manage your complaint in line with our complaints procedure, please get in touch with us if you would like a copy. If you’re still not happy, you may be able to refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service or the Pensions Ombudsman.

English law applies to this agreement and disputes will be settled by English courts.

If any individual term (or part of a term) included in these Terms is held by any Competent Authority to be unenforceable or invalid, it will be treated as being deleted but that will not affect the validity and enforceability of the rest of these Terms.

18. FSCS protection

Any cash held in your Accounts is eligible for protection under the FSCS. Individual investments may also be covered by the scheme in the event of the fund manager going out of business.

If you want any further information about the FSCS compensation arrangements, you can visit the FSCS website at https://www.fscs.org.uk/.

19. Changes to these Terms

These Terms will always be available on our Website.

We can make changes to this Agreement at any time where we have a valid reason to do so. Valid reasons include (but are not limited to) the following:

• to take account of:
  • changes in Regulatory Requirements or the interpretation of Regulatory Requirements or the decisions of an ombudsman;
  • in a proportionate way, changes in the costs and expenses we incur in connection with the provision of the Services;
  • changes in technology, systems and methods of operation, including the introduction of new systems or services;
  • the impact of changes in the way the Services are used on the fair allocation of costs and expenses between customers;
  • material changes in market practice or conditions;
• to make these Terms fairer, clearer or easier to understand; and
• to correct errors.

If we make changes to these Terms which we reasonably consider are not materially detrimental to you, we’ll let you know within 30 days of us making the changes.

If the changes are materially detrimental to you, we will ordinarily give you at least 30 days’ notice but we may need to change these Terms with shorter notice e.g. if there is a change to Regulatory Requirements which we have to action immediately.

If you don’t agree to these changes, we’ll let you know the options available for transferring your investments to another provider. If we don’t hear from you before the changes come into effect, we’ll assume that you’re happy to accept the changes made.

How we execute your trades

20. Placing a trade

Our Order Execution Policy tells you how we execute your trades, all your trading will be executed in accordance with the policy and any applicable regulations. In placing a trade, you and your adviser consent to the Order Execution Policy, including any changes notified to you.

Your adviser is responsible for initiating trade instructions via the App. You and your adviser are responsible for the accuracy of your instructions, and we will treat all instructions placed via the App as genuine. We can only place your trade if you have sufficient cash available in your Account for the trade and all applicable Charges.

Once you approve the trading instructions (and applicable Charges) from your adviser via the App, your trades will be treated by us as having been placed.

When you trade, we deal directly with the fund managers or their representatives and we execute each trade solely as your agent. The fund manager is responsible for the price of the trade and we accept no responsibility or liability for any errors or inaccuracies by the fund manager, its representatives or any third parties acting on their behalf.

A summary of the investment and details of our Charges and the charges related to the underlying investment will be available to view before you approve the trade in the App. You will also be able to see the cumulative effect of these charges and costs on the estimated returns on the investment. Any estimated returns are provided for illustrative purposes only and are based on data obtained from our third party suppliers, who do not accept legal responsibility for the accuracy of the data they provide. We do not accept any legal responsibility for the accuracy of their data, unless the issue is caused by any matter that is within our reasonable control.

21. How we execute trades

Trading is combined and queued with trades from other customers for that investment, and executed together in a bulk transaction once a day. This means there will be a delay between the time your trade is placed and when it is executed, which may affect the price you receive. We may also have to execute your trade in tranches and provide an average price per trade. If you place a trade after the cut off time it will be executed with the bulk transactions on the next Business Day.

Once the trade has been placed, we will show it as a pending transaction in your Account and we will earmark the amount of cash required to complete the trade, or the investment to be sold if it’s a sale. Earmarking means that the cash or investment cannot be used in any other way.

Our record of the time of receipt and execution of a trade will be conclusive unless obviously incorrect. You’ll need to tell us and your adviser if you do not receive confirmation that we have executed your trade within 3 Business Days of you placing the trade or if you receive confirmation of a trade which you did not place or which has not been completed to your instructions.

22. Settlement and contract notes

Trade settlement usually takes between 1 and 5 Business Days, and the actual settlement date will be shown in your contract note, which can be viewed via the App.

Once actual settlement has taken place for investments sold, you can then withdraw the sale proceeds from your Account.

A settlement failure is a failure to settle a trade. You will be exposed to this risk until settlement takes place. If there is a settlement failure, we will contact you and provide you with details of your options.

In some cases settlement may not take place by the intended settlement date. If that happens, you’ll remain obligated to complete the trade, unless there is a settlement failure.

We are not responsible for any delay in settlement as a result of circumstances which are beyond our reasonable control, or for the failure of any other party. If the other party’s failure results in a settlement failure, we will not make payment of the sale proceeds or deliver the investment to your Account.

23. Contract notes

The contract note is a legal record of your trade. You will be able to view the contract note for your trade in the App. We will send you a notification letting you know your contract note is available to view.

Your adviser is responsible for checking that the information on the Contract Note is correct and informing us as soon as possible if something is not correct.

24. Investment income and Corporate Actions

We’ll pay dividends or other investment income into your Account within 10 Business Days where we have received it electronically. There may be a delay to the receipt of your income if we receive your dividend by cheque as we’ll need to request an electronic payment. Sometimes we’ll need to adjust the payment but if this happens we’ll tell you.

We’ll inform your adviser of any Corporate Actions (e.g. rights issues) within 10 Business Days from our receipt. Your adviser is responsible for notifying you of Corporate Actions and giving us instructions for Corporate Actions, including dividends. Your adviser provides these instructions to us on your behalf and we will rely on the instructions from your adviser without seeking any confirmation or approval from you. If we don’t receive any instructions from your adviser and within any stated deadlines, the default option will apply as advised to us. The only exception is that we’ll always accept compulsory takeovers and mergers.

As your investments are held in a pooled investment account, Corporate Action units will be allocated to your Account proportionately, based on the number of units of the investment that you hold at the relevant date.

We don’t pass on shareholder perks, participate in shareholder interest groups or support reinvestment of cash dividends or additional shares/units on the dividend payment date.

Amounts allocated to your Account may be rounded down to the nearest tradable unit or penny. Any residual units from a Corporate Action which we cannot allocate to customers will be sold. The net proceeds of your allocation will be paid to your Account, rounded down to the nearest whole penny. Any residual cash from a Corporate Action which cannot be allocated on that basis will be retained by us.

If the Corporate Action requires the payment of cash from your Account, e.g. a rights issue, it is your adviser’s responsibility to ensure that there is enough cash available in your Account to make the payment. If there is not enough available cash at the required date as described in the Corporate Action, you will not be able to participate in the Corporate Action.

If a Corporate Action has restrictions on the type of investor who can participate, it is your adviser’s responsibility to check that you are eligible. If you are not eligible, the default option will apply.

Glossary

In these Terms, the following words have the specific meanings set out below.

Account: your account for your Stocks and Shares ISA or General Investment Account, which is where you can view all your transactions, cash and investments held with us. Your documents will also be stored here.

Agreement: these Terms, each Application and the Charges.

App: the Touch by AJ Bell mobile application which we make available to you to access your Accounts and receive the Services.

Application: the process for applying for an Account via the App, including your acceptance of these Terms and the declarations made by you in support of your application.

Business Day: any weekday, excluding bank holidays, on which banks are generally open in the UK.

Charges: (i) the charges that apply to the Services as set out on the Website (as amended from time to time) and (ii) any charges applied by a third party in relation to the part of the Services they help us to provide, which we tell you about and is payable by you.

Competent Authority: any national or local agency (e.g. the FCA or HMRC), authority, department, inspectorate, minister, ministry official, parliament or public or statutory person of any government or professional body having jurisdiction over any of the activities contemplated by the Agreement.

Corporate Action: an event initiated by a company or fund manager which impacts shareholders, e.g. dividends, takeovers, rights issues, open offers and consolidations.

Deposit: the payment of cash to your Account, including regular payments to your Account.

FCA: the Financial Conduct Authority or any applicable successor regulatory organisation.

FCA Rules: the rules set out in the FCA’s handbook of rules and guidance (as amended and updated from time to time).

FSCS: the Financial Services Compensation Scheme

GBP: British pound sterling

General Investment Account or GIA: the Touch general investment account we establish for you in accordance with these Terms.

Group: any member of the AJ Bell group, details of which can be found on our Website.

HMRC: HM Revenue & Customs.

ISA: an individual savings account managed in accordance with the ISA Regulations.

ISA Manager: a person, firm or company approved by HMRC to manage ISAs.

ISA Regulations: the Individual Savings Account Regulations 1998 (as amended from time to time).

Loss: damages, liabilities, costs, fines, payments, claims, actions, proceedings, expenses or other loss of any nature however it arises.

Nominee: Lawshare Nominees Limited or any other nominee company that is a member of our Group in whose name investments are recorded.

Order Execution Policy: our policy for managing the execution of trades, which is available on the Website.

Permitted Investment: the range of investments that you can hold in your Account.

Regulatory Requirement: statutory and other rules, laws, regulations, instruments and provisions in force from time to time, including (without limitation) the rules, codes of conduct, codes of practice, practice requirements and accreditation terms stipulated by any Competent Authority.

Retirement Investment Account or RIA: a retirement investment account which is a self-invested personal pension arrangement established for you under the Scheme.

Scheme: the Sippdeal e-sipp, which is the scheme you become a member of when you open an RIA.

Scheme Rules: the trust deed and rules (as amended from time to time), which govern the Scheme. A copy can be obtained from your adviser.

Services: (i) the provision and administration of your Account, (ii) the execution only dealing service we provide which allows you to trade; and (iii) the custody services including safe custody of your investments, the collection of dividends or interest on investments held, dealing with Corporate Actions and payment against delivery of stock.

Stocks and Shares ISA: the ISA we establish for you in accordance with these Terms, which is a stocks and shares ISA, as defined in the ISA Regulations.

Terms: these terms and conditions, including the Appendix where applicable.

Touch, we, us or our: the AJ Bell company which provides the relevant Services. Details are set out in the “About Touch” section of these Terms.

Transfer: the transfer of cash or investments to your: (i) RIA, which involves the transfer of your benefits to the Scheme from another operator of a UK registered pension scheme; or (ii) ISA from another ISA; or (iii) GIA, from you personally or from another general investment account.

Transfer Out: the transfer of all of your Cash and/or investments in relation to your: (i) RIA to another operator of a UK registered pension scheme; or (ii) ISA (subject to ISA Regulations) to another ISA Manager; or (iii) GIA to another general investment account provider.

UK: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland which excludes the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

Website: the website at ajbelltouch.co.uk (as amended and updated from time to time).

You/you, Your/your: the person that we have accepted as a customer and who we provide the Services to.

Contact details

Address: Touch by AJ Bell, 4 Exchange Quay, Salford Quays, Manchester M5 3EE

Tel: 0345 646 1661

Email: support@ajbelltouch.co.uk

Appendix – Touch Stocks and Shares ISA terms

These terms apply to the Stock & Shares ISA. They apply in addition to the Terms and form part of the Agreement between you and us for your Stock & Shares ISA.

Where the terms in this Appendix conflict with the Terms, the terms in this Appendix shall prevail. Where any of the terms in this Appendix or the Terms conflict with the ISA Regulations, the ISA Regulations will prevail.

1. Eligibility

You cannot open or make a Deposit into your Stocks and Shares ISA if you have already subscribed to another stocks and shares ISA in the same tax year, unless you are transferring that ISA to a Stocks and Shares ISA.

Your Application for a Stocks and Shares ISA is continuous. This means that you do not need to make another Application for a Stocks and Shares ISA provided at least one Deposit is made in each tax year and you remain eligible to make each Deposit, otherwise you will need to reapply.

You must inform us immediately if you stop being resident in the UK for tax purposes, or if as a non-resident you stop being a Crown employee, their spouse or civil partner. In such circumstances, you cannot make any additional Deposit to your Stocks and Shares ISA until you return as a UK resident.

The Stocks & Shares ISA is not a flexible ISA, which means if you take cash out, you cannot pay it back in again. If you withdraw any cash into your bank account it will no longer be held in a tax-advantaged account.

2. Our appointment as ISA Manager

You appoint us as the ISA Manager for your Stocks and Shares ISA. We will manage it in accordance with the Agreement, the FCA Rules and the ISA Regulations. You authorise us to exercise the obligations and powers of an ISA Manager under the ISA Regulations on your behalf and to comply with any other Regulatory Requirement.

We may delegate any of our functions as ISA Manager to a third party at our discretion but we will satisfy ourselves that anyone who we delegate to is competent to carry out those duties and responsibilities.

3. Deposits

You are responsible for ensuring that Deposits into your Stocks and Shares ISA do not exceed the HMRC annual ISA limits. If you Deposit more than the annual limit, we’ll place the surplus cash in a GIA in your name.

You can make an additional Deposit to your Stocks and Shares ISA following the death of your spouse or civil partner, as allowed under the ISA Regulations.

4. Investments

If any investment in your Stocks and Shares ISA is no longer permitted by the ISA Regulations, we will contact you with your options. If we do not receive a response within a reasonable timeframe, we will sell the investment. If we cannot sell the investment for any reason, the investment will be withdrawn from your Stocks and Shares ISA and registered in a General Investment Account in your name.

Any new investment arising from a Corporate Action which does not satisfy the qualifying requirements of the ISA Regulations, will be dealt with in accordance with the ISA Regulations.

You’ll need to tell us if you wish to receive annual reports and accounts (and any other information) issued to holders for investments held in your Stocks and Shares ISA.

Your adviser must make a separate request for each Corporate Action in relation to investments in your Stocks and Shares ISA. On request, unless we are prevented by Regulatory Requirements from doing so, we will arrange for you to attend and vote at unit holders’ meetings.

5. Tax and deductions

We will (and you authorise us to) deduct any tax or other charges HMRC may impose on interest payments.

We may disclose details of your Stocks and Shares ISA to HMRC.

Your Stocks and Shares ISA and the tax benefits will continue after your death, and we’ll act on the instructions of your Executors or personal representatives.

We may deduct cash from your Stocks and Shares ISA and/or sell any of your investments to realise cash if HMRC imposes a tax or other charge, fine or penalty on us which relates to your Stocks and Shares ISA.

6. Transfers in

You can transfer-in investments held in another stocks and shares ISA or cash ISA into your Stocks and Shares ISA. We’ll accept a transfer of all current year ISA payments and your previous tax years’ payments. However, if it would result in the ISA allowance being exceeded and we are otherwise unable to accept the Deposit by removing the excess amount in accordance with HMRC rules, we will reject the Deposit and inform your previous ISA Manager.

7. Transfers Out

If you instruct a Transfer Out of your Stocks and Shares ISA, your new provider must be another registered ISA Manager. You can only Transfer Out the full value of the Account. We will manage the Transfer Out in accordance with the ISA Regulations.

If you have instructed a Transfer Out of investments, we will provide you with details of the market value of the investments held in your Stocks and Shares ISA as at the date your Transfer Out completes.

Once the Transfer Out is complete, we will close your Stocks and Shares ISA and will not accept any further instructions in relation to the Account.

You can make an additional payment to your Stocks and Shares ISA following the death of your spouse or civil partner, as allowed under the ISA Regulations.

Appendix – Touch Retirement Investment Account terms

These terms apply to the RIA. They apply in addition to the Terms and form part of the Agreement between you and us for your RIA.

Where the terms in this Appendix conflict with the terms and conditions in this Appendix shall prevail. Where any of the terms in this Appendix or the terms and conditions conflict with the Scheme Rules, the Scheme Rules will prevail.

1. Deposits

You are responsible for ensuring that all Deposits are within allowable limits for tax relief. We will repay overpaid tax relief and interest on the amount of the overpayment on demand by HMRC from your RIA without your authority.

2. Unauthorised payments

We will only pay money from your RIA in accordance with the Scheme Rules. We will not make, and we will report to HMRC, any payment from your RIA which is not authorised under the Scheme Rules.

3. Death

The payments we make in relation to your RIA, and how these are taxed, will depend on the Scheme Rules, HMRC rules, your age at the time of death and the discretion of the administrator of the Scheme.

We may, at our discretion, pay death benefits arising in relation to your RIA to any one or more of your dependants, successors, nominees or other eligible recipients in accordance with the Scheme Rules.

Where you have notified us of your wishes, we will take them into account when exercising our discretion but are not bound by them.

When we exercise our discretion, we will inform the beneficiaries of the different ways in which the death benefits may be paid.

Touch by AJ Bell is provided by AJ Bell Management Limited (company number 03948391), AJ Bell Securities Limited (company number 02723420) and AJ Bell Asset Management Limited (company number 09742568). All companies are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. All companies are registered in England and Wales at 4 Exchange Quay, Salford Quays, Manchester M5 3EE.