It is often said a Royal occasion is a good day to bury bad news.
But given the minimal fanfare for Princess Eugenie's nuptials today (12 October), this one is probably not a safe bet to try and sneak something out.
So as the royals toast the happy couple and the news agenda winds down for the weekend, why not take a look back on the highlights from the week that was full of platform apologies, pensions and prosecutions.
1) Time to say sorry
It may have been a coincidence that platform technology provider FNZ said it was taking responsibility for bungling Aviva's replatforming on the same day the insurance giant announced its chief executive was leaving.
FNZ chief executive Adrian Durham said his company had learnt from the debacle that made Aviva's platform unavailable for six days earlier this year and said it won't happen again.
Considering FNZ is responsible for more than £330bn in assets under administration held with companies such as Standard Life Aberdeen, Santander, Lloyds Bank, Vanguard, Quilter, Aviva, Zurich and UBS, such projects should be old hat.
But the damage has been done and confidence dented, so Mr Durham's statement is rather bold given the next big task for FNZ is to ensure a smooth transition for Quilter’s replatforming project.
No pressure then.
2) Where is the cash?
A former HBos banker behind a £245m swindle has been told to repay just £131,332.92, while investigators scour the globe to recover the rest.
This is the story of banker Lynden Scourfield, who forced struggling clients to use the services of his friend David Mills.
He authorised eye-watering loans to high-risk clients from his HBos office in Reading and ordered them to engage with Mills's bogus company. That company then creamed off millions to fund property purchases, birthday bashes in Thailand and Barbados, trips to Ascot, and a yacht.
When the firms went into administration, Mills seized what assets were left and transferred them to his sham companies.
Scourfield's rewards included lavish gifts, hospitality, and romps with high-class hookers, even keeping a stash of viagra in a rented flat to fuel his orgy frenzies with porn star Suzie Best.
That viagra will be long out of date next time Scourfield wishes to use it, as he is currently serving an 11-year jail sentence for conspiracy to corrupt, money laundering and four counts of fraudulent trading.
3) The Sipp buck stops here?
It is always sad to read about people who have fallen victim to fraud, particular when it involves the loss of most or all of their pension savings.
But who is ultimately responsible for ensuring someone’s pension is invested appropriately?
Is it the financial adviser or the pension provider?
This is the debate that is raging across the industry and, more specifically for these purposes, in the courts this past week as pension provider Berkeley Burke defends its position.
In 2014 the Financial Ombudsman Service ordered the company to repay Wayne Charlton after he lost part of his pension to a fraudulent company, Sustainable AgroEnergy.
But Berkeley Burke says the ombudsman made an error in law, since it had no legal responsibility to investigate investments after a client was cheated out of his savings as the law did not require it.
The ombudsman said Berkeley Burke had a duty to carry out adviser-style due diligence on his investments.
But Jonathan Kirk QC, representing the company, said the company clearly stated it was not their responsibility to investigate investments before clients opened an account with them and that the law, at that point, did not require them to do so.
4) What value a transfer?
Here is a statistic about defined benefit (DB) pension transfers that should cause people to sit up and listen: savers a decade away from retirement are only offered 57 per cent of their pension value when they transfer out.
A survey of 200 DB schemes from consultancy firm LCP found this was the median value offered by pension funds to their members when they requested a transfer.
Under the FCA's new rules financial advisers must provide their clients with a value of how much the benefits in their DB scheme would cost today in the open market, called the transfer value comparator (TVC).
The survey found the range of transfer values offered by different schemes was very large – some schemes offered 40 per cent of the full value while others offered double this.
Jonathan Camfield, partner at LCP, said the findings show very clearly that those who transfer out are forgoing a great deal of certainty about their future retirement income and that this certainty is of considerable value.
It is understandable that some people have good reasons to transfer, but for most people, the words of my father come to mind: don’t do it.
5) Where there is blame there is a claim
Incessant calls from claims management companies (CMCs) are not just a nuisance, they can be bad for your health.
Such was the case for Andrew Oliver, a director of Kent-based Andrew Oliver & Co, who was facing his first Financial Ombudsman Service complaint in 20 years as an IFA because of one of these CMCs.
The complaint relates to an alleged mis-selling of PPI, which Mr Oliver said is a product he has never sold.
It was actually related to a single life accident and sickness insurance product. But it wasn't PPI.
Shortly after receiving this complaint he ended up in hospital overnight, diagnosed with atrial fibrillation and wired up to a heart monitor because his heart was "beating too fast".
Mr Oliver followed the correct procedures, proved that PPI had not been sold and dismissed the claim. He then invoiced the claims management company £300 for wasting his time.
Wouldn’t you know it, the CMC dismissed the invoice, so Mr Oliver took them to small claims court.
