A financial services lawyer says Standard Life material about its Pension Sterling Fund was "misleading."
He says the city regulator should be examining the fact sheets to consider if compensation should be paid.
Standard Life has already said it will compensate people who invested after it revalued the fund on 23 December.
But it insists "customer literature [showed] the fund was invested... in a range of short dated money market instruments."
Subprime involvement
However, documents seen by BBC Radio 4's Money Box programme show that in March 2008 a fact sheet issued by Standard Life showed 100% of the fund - sold as a safe harbour for pension money shortly before retirement - was in cash.
Standard Life |
Adam Samuel, a lawyer who advises companies on whether their product information conforms to regulations, which say it must be "clear, fair and not misleading" told Money Box the documents failed that test.
"There's a description of the asset type as being 100% in cash, which in the small print says could indicate some short term money market instruments.
"Mortgage backed securities tend to be over quite a long term so that's wrong.
"The documents are not clear, not fair and definitely misleading."
Due compensation?
His comments were made a week after Standard Life told Money Box there were no grounds to compensate its customers.
Adam Samuel, lawyer |
Adam Samuel says the documents show there is a case for taking the compensation back much further.
"The Financial Services Authority should be sitting down with Standard Life and going through documentation for each year and deciding whether their descriptions of the fund pass the clear, fair and not misleading test.
"In reality that may mean compensating everybody."
Standard Life response
Standard Life told the programme that the information provided to customers was not misleading and in a statement said:
"It has been detailed in our customer literature that the fund was invested not only in deposits but also in a range of short-dated money market instruments.
"As soon as sufficiently reliable information was available, the securities held in the fund were revalued.
"That led to a reduction in the unit price."
The company would not comment in writing on the suggestion that compensation should be extended.
The FSA would not comment.
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