So complicate pricing even more by introducing percentage based pricing along side fixed pricing ?
Imo this is the reason other platforms exist. One of the reasons Vanguard is quite good is that starting a pension is relatively cheap with them, but at the expense of both choice of investment, and time of investment.
Similarly with AJ Bell, I assume you’re looking at restricting your investments to minimise the fees? The platform fee isn’t their only SIPP fee, you still have dealing charges of £5 for shares (including ETFs) and £1.50 for funds.
Even if you only use their regular investing option that reduces that fee to £1.50 (at the expensive of reducing the range of available investments), your restricted to investing only 5 investments per month before its more expensive than Freetrade (assuming a maximum SIPP of £10k)
Additionally they have a 0.75% Fx fee.
Sure, you might be able to make it a little cheaper. At the expense of limiting availability of shares, limiting number of investment opportunities.
And there’s the added complexity of managing what you’re spending. Whats easier? £10/m; or every month keep track of number of investments vs total SIPP balance?
Freetrade is more expensive if you have a small SIPP, and so for people who are just looking to invest in a single fund or similar Vanguard is the best option until you reach about 80k (and they are a good platform, better than AJ Hell (as some put it here))
But anyone wanting access to more options these platforms tend to not offer what you’d want or can quickly become more expensive or increase in complexity as you need to impose barriers to your investing. Realistically £120 a year for access to an investment platform is very little.
You pay more for your streaming services… which is just disposable entertainment
Disney+ premium is £110 a year
Netflix premium is £215 a year
Amazon prime is £95 a year (plus another £36 a year to remove ads)
Freetrade is £120 a year
So while reducing fees is a good thing. We also need to be realistic, you’re not comparing the same things, and when we’re saying £120 a year for SIPP and ISA is expensive… its kind of ludicrous
But if you do have a small pension just now, and you dont want to invest in anything but a handful of funds, go move it to Vanguard for now unless you think you’d benefit from the Freetrade plus plan that includes the SIPP and want to be able to invest in more things and get the lower Fx
(Also remember to vote for your own idea)