UHY Hacker Young has stopped pension payments to some Hartley Pension clients over what it called “regulatory issues”.
Clients of Hartley Pensions alerted FT Adviser that their regular drawdown payments had stopped as of last week.
But when these clients questioned why this was, they were unable to get a detailed answer from the administrators.
Peter Kubik at UHY Hacker Young, told FT Adviser: "We regret that it has been necessary to pause pension payments to some Hartley Pensions customers for regulatory reasons.
“Unfortunately it is not possible to provide any further detail at present.
“We hope to be able to resume these payments in the coming weeks and apologise to any customer affected by this pause."
Paul Adams, a client of Hartley Pensions, said he cannot understand why he cannot be told why there is an issue as it is “his money”.
“I am concerned that all my pension assets are under threat and I have had no income for the past three months, as I only draw every three months,” he said.
Another client of Hartley Pensions, John Jones, said he had lost faith in the administrators.
He said: “They are costing my Sipp account money by withdrawing fees, fees that I believe they don't deserve or have earned.
“They have cancelled my monthly pension payment that should have been paid into my bank account on the 1st.
“They have delayed the sending of the documents for the transfer out, which should have been some months ago. Still waiting, as I have a ‘toxic’ Sipp, allegedly.”
Hartley Pensions first went into administration at the request of the Financial Conduct Authority back in July 2022.
Since then, clients have been waiting to be able to transfer out.
In September, Hartley Pension clients who have toxic assets in their self-invested personal pensions faced more delays as they were told there was "no timeline" for their transfers.
Morgan Lloyd, a pensions management and administration business, was appointed to receive Hartley transfers in June after a period of due diligence by administrators UHY Hacker Young and interaction with the FCA.
Administrators UHY Hacker Young previously set out how transfers would happen in tranches, with the most simple investments going first.
The FCA was unable to comment.
amy.austin@ft.com
