One of the last providers of low-cost personal Crest accounts, Fidelity Personal Investing, will be withdrawing the service from next month.
The fund manager has decided to stop offering its ShareNetwork account - which provides Crest membership and is administered by Charles Stanley Direct - to focus on developing a new, integrated brokerage service.
Personal Crest accounts allow investors to be named on shareholder registers as the legal owners of shares, enabling them to receive company accounts and voting rights directly. However, the number of Crest providers has been falling in recent years.
A spokesperson for Fidelity said: "Crest was offered to those on the ShareNetwork Account which was provided by Fidelity and administered by Charles Stanley Direct. As we are developing our own sharedealing proposition, we will no longer be offering the Charles Stanley Direct ShareNetwork service from 5 March 2016. Customers will continue their sharedealing services with Charles Stanley Direct."
The ShareNetwork account allowed customers to trade shares within personal Crest accounts for a monthly fee of £5.10 and flat £9 online trading fee.
Charles Stanley charges Crest members £240 in addition to transaction charges and an annual account fee of £180 for execution-only clients.
Very few brokers sponsor personal Crest accounts and none of the major platforms do, despite UK shareholder societies championing it as the best method to hold shares.
Blankstone Sington, MD Barnard & Co, Killik, Redmayne Bentley and Walker Crips Stockbrokers are among some of the brokers that continue to support personal Crest membership.
*Clarification: The Crest charges quoted in this article do not apply to Fidelity ShareNetwork Account holders.
