The delay can climb to several months and during this time the saver has no hands on his investments.
by Laurence Boccara
While the equity savings plan (PEA) is blowing its 30 candles this year, its transfer from one bank to another, legally authorized and without loss of tax priority, is a real galley. In its annual report, published on April 20, 2022, the mediator of the Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) reports a doubling of disputes related to the PEA between 2020 and 2021.
Faced with this observation and in order to identify “these dysfunctions”, the AMF set up, in September 2022, a working group which is working on this thorny file. Pending the publication of possible recommendations against banking establishments depositaries of these plans and a requirement for more transparency concerning the information provided to customers, many individuals are already stuck in these long -term procedures.
Even if there is no regulatory deadline, “the” normal “time of a transfer is about one month,” said Philippe Parguey, managing director of Nortia. In reality, this operation is much longer. In his report, the AMF mediator indicates that “these concern deadlines can sometimes reach three, six, nine or even twelve months”. And when the machine really gets, it can go up to eighteen months. “It is the situation of a customer of Ing Direct who asked for the transfer of his plan. It was an unhappy timing, because after his request, this online bank decided to stop its activity in France and sold His portfolio of customers, “says Michel Guillaud, President of France Conso Banque, an association for the defense of individuals with problems with their bank.
Double penalty
In these blocking situations, it is often the double penalty for the saver. In addition to a procedure that drags and sometimes remains for several weeks at “deadline”, the latter becomes, sometimes without knowing it, vulnerable. Thus, he is despite himself in financial risk. The reason for this weakness situation? By asking for the mobility of its plan, the departure bank begins with “freezing” it, making it inaccessible. It then becomes impossible to carry out operations and therefore to carry out arbitrations in line with the evolution of the equity market. “In a bullish scholarship, we can miss market opportunities with a possible shortfall,” says Edouard Michot, founder and president of insurancevie.com.
When the market falls, as is the case in 2022, it is obviously much worse. In this configuration, the losses are likely to accumulate dangerously. “Failure to manage their blocked PEA, some of my clients have suffered financial damage which amounts to 25,000 to 300,000 euros. We must prove the concept of losses of luck to have been able to act in time,” said Ludovic Huet , lawyer specializing in banking issues. “We process a dozen files of this kind per year. This almost always gets stuck between the departure bank which always drags their feet and that of arrival which does not manage to obtain all the information on the history of the PEA”, specifies -Al. “It is an interminable part of ping-pong between the two establishments. And it sometimes turns into the dialogue of the deaf. In addition, the holder of the plan is only warned of deadlines,” comments Michel Guillaud.
You have 38.22% of this article to read. The continuation is reserved for subscribers.