Hargreaves Lansdown delays fee-cap hike for select clients after backlash
Select customers will keep the lower annual fee cap until the end of February 2027 instead of facing the planned jump in charges. 9: 00 a. m. ET — Hargreaves Lansdown has offered a postponement of the cap to a small group of clients after backlash from high-net-worth and previously loyal users.
Immediate change: targeted postponement of the £150 fee cap by Hargreaves Lansdown
Hargreaves Lansdown emailed a limited set of clients offering to postpone the increase to the annual charge cap — originally set to more than triple from £45 to £150 — until the end of February 2027. The offer applies only to customers already contacted by the platform and will not be offered more widely, and it changes only the price cap for those recipients.
Pricing overhaul details introduced in January that remain in force
The company introduced a refreshed pricing regime that reduced the annual platform charge for Isas, self-invested personal pensions (Sipps) and GIAs from 0. 45% to 0. 35% and added a fund trading fee of £1. 95 per trade while cutting the platform’s share trading fees. Other changes announced in January came into effect for all customers on 1 March.
Which customers face bigger bills and how some avoided the immediate rise
Hargreaves Lansdown says eight in ten customers will be better off or see no change under the new structure, but clients with large share, investment trust or ETF portfolios will still face sharp increases. For example, an investor with a £500, 000 share portfolio held in an Isa who makes one trade per month and did not receive the cap postponement will see annual charges rise from £188 to £233.
That shift prompted reports of customers with sizeable stock, trust and ETF holdings leaving the platform to search for cheaper alternatives. Still, the company framed the targeted incentive as a loyalty gesture: a spokesperson for Hargreaves Lansdown said, “We run targeted incentives and promotions across the year as another way of adding great value and saying thank you to clients for trusting Hargreaves Lansdown with their savings and investments. ”
Only the price cap has been changed the targeted offer; all other pricing updates in the overhaul remain applicable to the broader customer base.
The postponement narrows immediate exposure for the small group that received the email but leaves larger-portfolio customers who were not contacted exposed to higher fees and the decision to move assets elsewhere.
Next confirmed milestone: the targeted cap postponement runs until the end of February 2027; if the delay holds, the higher £150 cap will apply from March 1, 2027.
