Transferring IDECO (and NISA) accounts

[ToushiTime]

Hi,

If I shift my IDECO account to another provider, what happens to the existing IDECO investments?
Do they stay where they are, or will they be moved to the new brokerage?

Also, I read that differences in account names can mess up the transfer process.
This would apply to me as one of my brokerages truncates my name.

Does anyone have any experience of this?
How was it resolved, if at all?


*Sorry for the partial re-post, I was hoping to get sutebayashi's attention in the other thread re. his hassle transferring to Monex back in 2018

[RetireJapan]

If I shift my IDECO account to another provider, what happens to the existing IDECO investments?
Do they stay where they are, or will they be moved to the new brokerage?

I moved my wife's iDeCo account to SBI a couple of years ago.

The process was as follows (assuming I am remembering correctly).

Apply to the new provider. Current provider sells all investments and transfers the money to new provider. You designate what to buy with the new provider ('switching') and set up future purchases.

It takes a few months and you will miss out on those contributions, so generally speaking it is worth considering whether it is worth changing providers.

[ToushiTime]

Thanks, so unlike NISA, the IDECO investments actually get moved to the new brokerage?

And did you have any of the name issues like Sutebayashi had in 2018?

[RetireJapan]

Thanks, so unlike NISA, the IDECO investments actually get moved to the new brokerage?

And did you have any of the name issues like Sutebayashi had in 2018?

Yes, the entire account balance is transferred over. This also means your money is out of the market for a few months.

My wife has a 'normal' kanji name, so no issues.

[ToushiTime]

This also means your money is out of the market for a few months.

What happens to the contributions you would have made during that time?

Were you given a chance to make them up?

[RetireJapan]

This also means your money is out of the market for a few months.

What happens to the contributions you would have made during that time?

Were you given a chance to make them up?

You can't contribute until the new account is up and running. There is no system to 'make them up'. So there is quite a big cost to changing iDeCo providers.

For my wife, this was worth it because she was changing from a bank with high fund fees (the best option when we opened the account but not competitive when we moved it) to a cheap broker.

Assuming you have a normal iDeCo account with a broker I would think carefully about whether it is worth moving.

[ToushiTime]

Yes, your replies have basically decided it for me.
I probably won't bother for IDECO.

[sutebayashi]

Yeah, in the end I didn’t really get much convenience benefit from switching providers. Especially as I am no longer even adding to the iDeCo due to having a company DC plan now… in the end I ended up with multiple accounts, so silly me for trying to consolidate them.

I think I had a Rakuten iDeCo first so probably its offerings were good enough, too.

[ToushiTime]

Ok thanks. I may post a separate question about transferring NISA accounts. Have you ever tried that?

[sutebayashi]

Nope, haven’t. Been with Monex from the outset and happy enough.