What should one look for in an advisor-distributor or what the Americans call broker-dealer?

Well let us look at what one should be careful if a distributor is a person whom you do not know?

1. Do some kind of a back ground check if he approaches you.

2. If he has been recommended by a friend, make sure your friend, colleague, relative, sibling, parent have some experience of dealing with him

3. Make the cheques in the name of the FUND HOUSE and make sure you write YOUR NAME and scheme name BEHIND the cheque also so that the fund house knows that this is your application….not somebody else’s.

4. For many readers point no. 3 is redundant (or that is what they feel) because today a fund house does not accept 3rd party cheques. Correct? Wrong. For a fraudulent distributor generating a letter authorising the fund house to use it for a 3rd party transaction is not difficult.

5. As soon as you get the statement (in good quality colour letterhead of the fund house) call the fund house to check the amount invested or that day’s Assets under Management – preferably by calling the help line of the FUND HOUSE or the fund house itself.

6. Make sure that your distributor’s name appears only as a distributor and not as a second holder (i recently heard of such frauds!!).

7. Once in 5-6 months call the fund house and check your balance – maybe even do a Rs. 5k transaction – just like that!

8. Get a H Pin number and see your fund amount from time to time.

9. NEVER ACCEPT A statement issued by the distributor even if he is a big distributor (remember the Citibank Gurgaon case? LOL)

I am sick of hearing sob stories…..and ‘helping’ people for free. Seriously thinking of staring a paid program called ‘PYA’. The full form is of course …Protect your a*&( !!

read on

http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/canara-robeco-investors-lose-crores-to-fraud-/436645/

  1. 6th point is interesting. Never heard about it before. It looks like that there are some very nice distributors around us. Lot of such stories come to your ears first!

    What is the pricing of PYA program? Looking for any franchisee in Chennai?

  2. i think people should know the price of their A no? why should I do the pricing? LOL!!

    i think the biggest money will be when Goldman Sachs decides to buy me out for a few trillion. L O L!!

  3. Funny thing is the news article linked above is now removed from Business standard , Times of india , Rediff.com . Wondering if what made all the articles remove the news .

    There is a cached version of the article available on google though .
    http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:6PjZ-ifSkPIJ:www.business-standard.com/india/news/canara-robeco-investors-lose-crores-to-fraud-/436645/+canara-robeco-investors-lose-crores-to-fraud&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=in&source=www.google.co.in

  4. it’s there here:
    http://smartinvestor.in/market/story-74276-storydet-Canara_Robeco_investors_lose_crores_to_fraud.htm

    With this correction:
    CLARIFICATION
    The headline was changed from “Canara Robeco investors lose crores to fraud” to “Canara Robeco investors lose lakhs to fraud”.
    Some investors in mutual fund schemes of Canara Robeco Asset Management have lost money because of fraudulent activity by one of its distributors and not by the fund house. The loss to investors as a result was not in crores of rupees, but was estimated at Rs 34 lakh, according to a clarification issued by Canara Robeco. The clarification was issued in response to the inaccurately headlined report. We regret the errors.

  5. After seeing ‘Inside Job’, one cannot rule out possibilities like “Subra’s PYA Program” (SPYAP) being bought for atleast few billions (are you planning to buy any country with trillions?). Let us wait for next bull run.

    With Deepak and I showing immediate interest (he has first mover advantage by a minute), even a small equity in SPYAP would fetch us few millions. I’m contended with the same.

    Excellent observation by Mr.Debashis!

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