Updated T&Cs: effective 31 May 2017

Interesting point gnasher. I am in the process of moving from 2% fully invested to 1%. Whilst on 2% I had allocations in proportionate to my total invested and percentage chosen.
Recently I have had several allocations that dont fit the pattern. I would be interested to see Steves response.

We are rolling out the changes to the copy on our website etc over the coming days.

The increased minimum will impact new clients immediately.
Existing clients have until 31 July regarding the minimums. As per the emails.

The revised fee structure will kick in on 31 May. As per the notification email.

There are no other changes.

Is the question being asked and re-asked here really why someone was issued with a £70 loan part as opposed to an £80 loan part?

I'm starting to see why stevefindlay feels the need to increase fees to continue full dialogue with all platform users ........

If I promise to ask no questions and let you get on with things can I still pay 1% Steve ??  
(I can see the irony that I've just asked him a question  )

jester. No. My reasked question is why am I allocated less than £100 when my normal allocation is many multiples of that with no change in funds on account. I do agree with your overall message though.

But it appears to have put the cart before the horse!

My point was the email said the changes - specifically including the new minimums - were scheduled for introduction on 31 May, and up until 2 days ago your ads on here were saying £1k minimum investment.  Therefore that email did not in fact provide transparency of advance warning for half of the changes noted, as claimed!

Thanks for the reassurance

I fully comprehend the rationale for change, and of course given the appropriate notice it is perfectly reasonable for a business to do so.  However, in this case there are several aspects which don't stack up:

1. The increase in minimum investment has been implemented in an apparently unplanned way eg. inappropriate ads, anomalous FAQ info and inaccurate guidance;

2. With a (relatively) new platform and little track record, many investors are likely to start small to assess performance - especially allied to the cash drag implications. 

3. The decision to change the terms of EXISTING accounts so dramatically and quickly is unsettling - I can see little justification for not allowing a more phased approach.

Overall, the changes seems to be unnecessarily rushed and unappreciative of some pioneer investors.  The suddenness of the transition itself gives rise to some potential unease . . . . .

Please note that I am not requesting or requiring any justification, just wanted to express my opinion !

We have ~200-250 clients with £1,500 or less.  We are grateful for every client that has chosen to place their hard earned funds with BondMason.

In the interests of transparency:

In:
 - Our fee each year is £15 for each client with £1,500 (or £22.50 in the new fee structure)

Out:
 - On average, we communicate with each client 3-4 times a year.  This is typically a couple of email exchanges and 1-2 calls of 30mins-1 hour each
 - It costs us £2.50 to conduct AML / KYC on each client
 - There is a cost associated with each deposit and withdrawal each client makes
- [There is also a cost to acquire each client, but that is a sunk cost for existing clients so irrelevant here]

So you can see that the cost of servicing clients below a certain level of capital deployed is simply uneconomic based on the actual level of client servicing that has been required (we lose money at the gross margin level as a business on all of these clients - regardless of whether they are existing or new).  In the thread above we shared the options open to us to enable us to continue to service as many clients as possible, which culminated in the £5k min and fee change.

Our revised fee structure should enable us to retain the £5k minimum forever after.  

I understand the frustration of existing clients, and if there was a way we could sensibly keep everyone, we would. I think they only way would be to offer an alternative product - a black box rather than a transparent box - which gives rise to the potential for fewer questions. But we aren't in a position to do this today.