Barclays investors to lobby parliament

The fall-out concerns the Aviva Global Balanced Income Fund, sold and rated by Barclays as a balanced fund when it was introduced in 2006.

However, in July 2007, Barclays introduced a new framework for assessing customer risk appetite and categorised its third-party funds in line with the new framework, which meant previous terminology used did not carry the same meaning.

As a result, the Aviva Global Balanced Income Fund was reclassified by Barclays as adventurous, but due to what Barclays terms as a "procedural error" the fund was sold as a balanced fund to clients who invested in the period between July and December 2007.

Members of the Barclays Investment Victims Fund action group, set up earlier this month (May), some whom were approaching retirement at the time, are now seeking compensation after allegedly losing thousands of pounds by being invested in a fund that did not match their risk profile.

Paul Cooper, of claims handling firm claims-uk.co.uk, who is representing some of the investors, hopes the Financial Services Authority (FSA) will investigate their claims of mis-selling.

He said: "I am extremely concerned about the compliance systems for dealing with funds which are transferred. Many Barclays customers have lost half their life's savings.

"Simply, in a year the fund has fallen 38 per cent compared to the average of the balanced sector of 21 per cent. People who invested in 2007 have lost much more."

Cooper also claimed Barclays had offered some of the investors as little as £50 compensation in the first instance.

He is now spurring members of the action group to lobby their MPs.

He added: "The plan is to encourage all people who’ve lost their money to speak to MPs in their constituency and next month organise a parliamentary lobby."

A spokeswoman for Barclays declined to provide specific information about how many compensation claims it has paid or how many complaints it has received.

However, she adamantly denied any allegations of mis-selling.

The spokeswoman said: "We have no evidence of systematic mis-selling at Barclays.

"We recognise there will be occasions we get it wrong; in these cases we have fair and effective systems to ensure we correct any mistakes."