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So I was contacted by deVere sometime late 2013 and signed on to a policy/product. Somewhere along the line I lost my job and things went bad.

I needed cash so I decided to withdraw from the policy and cash out.

It's been over 10 months now of disappointment, and the account manager won't pick up my calls or return missed calls till I make the one and half hour drive to their office only to be promised a new date which is not kept. Now I feel a lot of regret having signed up with this institution here in Ghana.

Thanks

BAF

Hi, I was approached by financial advisors of the Vere Group (in Switzerland) and they advised Generali Vision Plan. Although the 1st financial advisor seemed very engaged and I signed up to the Generali Vision Plan short thereafter he left the company and since there has been enormous rotation leading to practically no followup, delays in portfolio changes and limited advise, which led me to have to start doing it myself.

Recently I noticed that the fees of my Vision plan were significantly higher then was explained to me by the Veere Group.

In short it seems that it will become difficult to get a positive return on this plan. This is always a risk when investing, and I am sure De Vere Group has professional advisors as well, but I would suggest to be very vigilant on what you sign up to.

In 2009 we approached a firm named Siddals in UK to obtain advice on investments which were to provide an income for our retirement in Spain. We made it very clear that we were not prepared to invest in anything that put our capital at any serious risk. The questionnaire that we completed confirmed our investment profile as “cautious”, which was described as follows: “I am cautious and dislike risk. I prefer security of capital and predictable investments. I accept that this may result in low rates of return being earned on my portfolio. I also accept that interest returns from deposit based investments move up and down, and when compared with the rate of inflation may produce a poor real return.” The proportion of my portfolio allocated to this risk profile was 100%. Siddals was subsequently taken over by the deVere Group.

In November 2009 deVere produced a report that recommended four funds: (a) Aria Absolute Income Protected Fund, (b) EEA Life Settlements Fund (c) Iveagh Wealth Fund, and (c) New Earth Solutions. The Aria fund offered 80% protection of the invested capital.

In June 2010 on the advice of deVere Spain’s managing director we sold our Aria investment and invested heavily in United Asset Management Strategic Growth Fund, United Asset Management Sàrl of Port Valais, Switzerland, (UAM). At that time, and not disclosed by deVere, was the fact that the deVere Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Nigel Green, was the 100% owner of UAM. This is clearly confirmed by the registration records of the Confédération Suisse of which I have copies.

At the time we were given a factsheet that described the fund as being “United Asset Management – Strategic Growth Fund”. The factsheet also stated that “currently, Mr Kellermann acts as the fund manager to United Asset Management”. This refers to Mr Cobus Kellermann, who at that time was joint owner of the Mauritius based Belvedere Management Group with Mr David Cosgrove. In a newsletter in March 2015 deVere claimed to have had a role in exposing alleged investment fraud being carried out by Belvedere. What deVere failed to mention was that the perpetrators of that fraud, Messrs Kellermann and Cosgrove, held senior positions in United Asset Management at the time and were instrumental in the failure of the Strategic Growth Fund.

Mr Cosgrove one of has, due to his failure to comply with the codes of the FSA, subsequently been disqualified by the Financial Services Commission of Mauritius from “holding position as officer in any licensee of the FSC for a period of 5 years”.

According to its News Letters deVere boast that it is the worlds largest “independent financial adviser”. As such it has an obligation to remain completely independent. This obligation was breached by its selling of investments through a company wholly owned by its CEO who was benefiting from an additional layer of fees paid by us as the investors.

In February 2013 deVere informed us of problems with the UAM Strategic Growth Fund and advised us to sell our holdings. We completed a dealing form instructing the sale of those holdings and the purchase of holdings in an alternative fund. Unfortunately, the advice from deVere was given far too late and on 22 February 2013, only five months after Nigel Green disposed of his interests in United Asset Management, the Strategic Growth Fund was suspended. Since 27 October 2015, the fund has been in administration with no guarantee of any monies being recovered by investors.

In November 2015 we submitted a complaint to deVere’s customer relations department. We received a response, not from deVere Customer Relations, but from deVere Corporate Legal. In its various responses to our complaint deVere has endeavoured to distance itself from UAM by saying that the Strategic Growth Fund had nothing to do with UAM. Initially deVere stated that the association between the two on the factsheet was solely for marketing purposes. If that were the case then the fund was, at best, being mis-represented.

deVere then changed its stance by stating that “whilst the fund in question may be labelled as the UAM Strategic Growth Fund by SEB Life International in its statements ...” This is a blatant attempt to distort the truth as the insurer at the time of our investment in UAM Strategic Growth Fund in 2010 was Irish Life International Ltd and not SEB. We also have a series of emails directly from deVere at that time which clearly label the fund as being “United Asset Management Strategic Growth Fund”.

Despite admissions by deVere that there was a serious conflict of interest and that there were other faults on its part the deVere Corporate Legal department constantly looks for loopholes and refuses to consider our complaint on its merits.

Through its unethical approach in advising us to invest in funds that were not appropriate for our risk profile, and its poor management, deVere has caused us to suffer a substantial financial loss and years of stress. This situation warrants financial recompense from deVere to compensate us for loss and stress.

A word to those looking for information on scams & unethical dealings by DeVere.They engage in careful content management and 'flood' sites like these with their responses which then rank first....knowing that people are lazy researchers.

Google's own research shows 53% of people do not look beyond the first two responses and 89% do not look past page one. They are 'managing' (read: manipulating) this site to bury their sins. This company is the worst of the worst- incapable of change as the corporate culture is rotten top down to bottom. They do employ naïve & desperate sales people who may appear plausible.

Tough times are coming to Dubai (Oct 2016) - hopefully this parasitic company will finally fold in this time- and never be heard of again.

Caute!

I first started with DeVere when I met one of their consultants in Cyprus,where they were based-all was well at first. They suddenly closed their local office and I was left with no information of who to contact.

4 weeks later I instigated contact with their London office and was able to resume a relationship with DeV . However as time passed I found that I was being passed from various consultants only discovering this when I initiated the contact, by 2015 I spoke to UK as I was not happy with the performance of my portfolio, to be told that at least it was better than the Cypriot Banks!!

4weeks after this I was still waiting for recommendations for my portfolio.

In addition to the above my consultant in Cyprus personally borrowed money from me, then went to their AD office in Middle East, she has not fully repaid this money and now refuses all contact. Suffice to say I have moved elsewhere, and would find it hard to recommend DeV to anyone

Invested in UAM Strategic Growth fund on advice of your adviser. He told me that it was medium-low risk. I even note that your founder Mr Green played a big part in UAM and knew about this funds executives. Apparently you say you advised investors to leave the fund but I for one never got any such communication.

In fact from inception of policy until I noticed that the fund was suspeneded there was zero communication form your represenatives.

Upshot--Guess what I lost the lot when the fund collapsed. Since then I've sent several emails to your client department and the adviser - latest emails get no reply

Obviously once you've got your pound of flesh the investor doesn't matter anymore

Shame on you!

not going to write an essay or anything straight to the point.

Everything the Devere group say is a fraud..

there is no real incentives.

its like working being imprisioned in a cell with no window

no travel cost or accomodations included.

they say Visa takes 3 months and it is done on purpose so you have to spend money from your own pocket..

PLease and i beg my following job hunters who seem to be interested in this so called opportunity of a life time to NOT GO AHEAD WITH IT.

if something sounds to good to be true then it probably isnt.

Devere Shanghai =bad bad bad.

Summary- my wife and I were told our policy had flexibility (i.e.- withdraw funds up to 50% of net worth at any time in ten working days) when in fact the policy Devere Shanghai sold us has no flexibility. Fees? Exorbitant! 2400 USD per year! Not in writing or in any literature.

You thinking about using Devere as your broker for FPI? Get every detail you can possibly think of in writing. Read on for our sob story and beware Devere Shanghai. They are sales-man. They are NOT financial advisors, not friends, and in my opinion, not to be trusted.

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My wife and I opened a ‘retirement / college’ fund account in 2012 through DeVere in Shanghai, China. One of the good points of the product our broker recommended to us was it’s ‘flexibility’, according to our Shanghai Devere broker. "At any time (after the initial 18 month start-up period) you can withdraw up to 50% of the funds in the account for any reason and receive the funds within 10 working days." He knew that was a sales-closer for us. My wife and I wanted that flexibility. He said it did. We signed. 18 months went by.

We had an emergency in the family and needed to withdraw some funds. We contacted our broker at DeVere Shanghai multiple times via email and phone, even had him over for dinner twice and explained that we needed to withdraw 10,000 USD of our holdings (less 50%). We were ignored. After 2 months, we finally were able to set up an appointment at the DeVere office in Shanghai. We met with our broker at which time he asked us ‘why’ we wanted to do withdraw funds (like it’s any of his bloody business), and that we ‘shouldn’t’ withdraw funds as this product wasn’t made for this type of flexibility. In the end he agreed to let us withdraw a paltry 5% of our policy’s net-worth. We were shocked and frustrated. We decided to go with this investment because we were directly told in no uncertain terms that we could pull funds up to 50% at any time after the initial 18 months. We knew that we would need to do this for our girls’ college education expenses and of course in cases of emergencies. We felt comfortable investing our money knowing that we had access to some of our money throughout the life of the product for these two reasons (college tuition and emergencies). We even spent time working out a tiered plan with our broker (i.e.- in 5 years, withdraw to pay tuition, in ten years, withdraw to pay tuition, etc…). This plan along with the figure we wanted as a final goal for retirement was what determined how much we would contribute every month.

A total farce.

We asked DeVere how much we were being charged for their services. It took our broker 6 weeks to provide us with an arbitrary verbally spoken (un-written) answer- "about 2400.00 USD" for the first 18 months, and similar charges annually no matter how small a monthly deposit might be for the length of the investment (which is different from what we were told by our broker initially which was that "the charge after the first 18 months would be $120 annually". Those charges never appeared in a statement or on our credit card that we used for payment. They just pulled it from our ‘funds’, is how our broker phrased it. "You’ll never see it," he said. "It’s built in." When pressed, the arbitrary figure popped up. They cannot show us how they got it and won’t put it in writing.

Again, we were shocked. NONE of this is mentioned in our agreement or the policy paperwork that we were given and signed off on. We asked our broker at DeVere Shanghai for an itemized list of annual service fees and any other ‘charges’. To this day they have not provided us with one. In the end, DeVere Shanghai gave us verbal, un-documented, arbitrary amounts. I’ve gotten a very clear feeling that they have no clue or more than likely simply do not want anyone to know. They hide their service fees as much as they can. They are NOT transparent with their fees. DeVere has never showed us ‘how’ they came up with their figures. Nothing is in writing. No receipt. No itemized charges. Magical figures pulled from the air. Not acceptable.

We asked to close the account. DeVere Shanghai told us that we would surrender almost all of our savings and the majority of our earnings if we were to do so. It took them 5 weeks to figure that out and get back to us. Again, none of this is in writing in our policy. Nowhere does it state in the policy given to us by DeVere, or the Friend’s Provident literature, that in closing the account we would forfeit our entire investment and savings. No-where. Those words do NOT exist in any paper work provided.

Of course we don’t want to lose our savings. We asked if we could stop payment for a time. The broker said that that could be arranged. They would contact us. They have not contacted us but, as of now, Devere has not charged us for the month of March or April 2014 but again, nothing is in writing. We have requested a document from DeVere stating that we requested a ‘holiday’ from payment but again we have been ignored. Nothing is signed. Nothing is in writing for this and we fear other charges or financial repercussions.

I wrote Friend’s Provident in London and asked for answers to the questions below.

In a nutshell our experience with Devere in Shanghai has been horrible. The *** is the guy who sold us this product walks around our school as a community volunteer, rubbing shoulders with others trying to groom future sales. I want to stand up and shout his name but I am not doing that. Why slander his name when it won’t accomplish anything? At this point it's a 'he said vs. he said' situation. Best thing is, dear reader, if you regard my complaint with any seriousness to simply avoid Devere Shanghai completely. Then maybe management will deal with their own weaknesses in their own ways as they see a loss of sales.

We are in communications with FPI in London trying to sever Devere from our product. At least in that regards we don’t have to pay Devere a penny for services un-rendered.

Avoid Devere Shanghai. If this is the best they can do then they deserve absolutely no business from anyone.

We requested the following from FPI in London. We are in the midst of determining how to self-manage our FPI account. Blessings to those willing to read through my long-winded diatribe.

- Complete breakdown of fees and annual charges of our investment. We want to know that if we have ‘X’ amount in our portfolio, then what is the ‘Y’ amount that Friends’ or a broker will charge per year.o Decreased pay-in: what is the procedure? What are the changes in annual fees? o Increased pay-in: How to increase our monthly contribution or add a lump-sum contribution? Procedure? Costs? Changes in annual fees?o Hiatus- are there options to take a holiday from payments? What are those details? What are the changes in annual fees? Can we get something in writing?

- Self managed vs. managed. o Self managed? • What are the practical functions we have to self manage our investment, such as a change of Funds, decrease or increase monthly pay-in, and funds- withdrawal? • What are the differences in annual charges between self-managed or broker-managed? • What are the costs to any changes we make through self-management?- Flexibility options- details on withdrawing funds.o How much? Include both minimum and maximum amounts.o When? Time period(s) withdrawals can be made.o Time from a request to seeing the money in our personal bank account?o How to withdraw? Procedure?o Complete costs, if any, associated with withdrawals.

Devere are the 'Wolfs of international investments scams'. You saw the movie Wolf of Wall St?

This is DeVere Group & most of their associated companies like PIC, DeVere & Partners. They run their opperation like a well run boiler room scam. Great glossy website, nice brochures, global coverage. There are only a handful of people (if that) in each Devere office that have been with Devere over 3+ years & have any creditable financial qualifications. For the majority it's like a revolving door with 3, 6 & 9 months being pivotal moments. Most of the Devere staff will tell you out & out lies about their financial qualifications & work history to make themselves LOOK CREDIBLE. They lean a 4 page script back tonfront which is designed to emotionally break you down into handing over 50+ % of you international expat wage package. The retirement plan that you need to save so hard for, they will tell you all the money can be taken out after 12-18 months (all lies).

If it's anything Devere then STAY WELL CLEAR!!

Devere are viewed as an international JOKE in the financial world. Some of their Managers have personally been locked up abroad for previously running boiler room scams (fact). These are the kind of people who work in their company so you can now see where all the ingrained lies come from.

Devere claim to have strategic relations with big American Banks (some of those just been fined millions of $'s for bad practice). This then gives an excuse to upfront charge you 4% to enter their 'unique invesments'. Reality is they take 10-12% for your investment, WHO DO YOU THINK PAYS FOR THAT?

Nigel Green part owns a Malta based QROPS trust which they lock your UK Pension into (READ THE SMALL PRINT). It might sound like min fees... Your money will then be invested into their own underperforming white labelled funds which are almost guaranteed to go backwards.

Devere write internet blogs about 'devere scams' in an attempt to deflect you from seeing the true extend of client/ex employee feedback which has worked its way on to the net.

A BBC Panorama investigation into high commission and administration charges levied by one Nigel Green and the many companies he operates, one in particular which keeps getting negative worldwide publicity, deVere Group. Just google Devere scammers to see the truth about this shoddy outfit. Simon Pratt one of their recently resigned Directors is is hiding from the Hong Kong Tax authorities.

Spencer Lodge another disgraced Director who renagged on a charity ball bid to help Elton John's Aids Foundation. He is just about to embark on opening a international offshore brokerage up in Dubai of all places. As if Dubai didn't have enough already! DeVere currently have three offices fleecing expat's of their life savings.

These people should be on SFO most wanted list for crimes against hard working expat's. There are more names to be added to the list of international thieves of which there are many within the deVere Group.

Be warned, stay clear of the glossy deVere website, & smooth talking salesman who will give you a word perfect scripted meeting. All deVere meetings are scripted to carefully push you into an expensive front loaded retirement policy.