Telegraph reconsiders PEPs

The Telegraph is reconsidering its plans to launch a service for readers to buy Tessas and PEPs off the page, in the face of advertiser opposition.

“If you buy through The Telegraph it will repatriate two per cent of the commission that the financial services companies would normally keep,” says Len Sanderson, deputy managing director of The Telegraph. “That’s what they don’t like and they are trying to stop us doing it.”

Advertisers have been questioning The Telegraph’s right to supply the execution-only service without a certificate from the Pensions and Investments Authority, but Sanderson maintains its link with an

Independent Financial Advisor would comply with all regulatory requirements.

Sanderson says the Telegraph may yet carry out the scheme in the face of opposition. “Because they are major advertisers, we will listen to them. But as more financial services go direct and find different ways of distributing their products, they will have less need of us as an advertising medium. So we are just being prudent managers of our business and looking to the future.”