Complaints

This profile includes complaints for Peoples Trust Company, part of Peoples Group's headquarters and its corporate-owned locations. To view all corporate locations, see Find Local Branches.

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Peoples Trust Company, part of Peoples Group has 2 locations, listed below.

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  Peoples Trust Company, part of Peoples Group

  1400 888 Dunsmuir St Floor 14 Vancouver, BC V6C 3K4

  
• 

  Peoples Trust Company, part of Peoples Group

  1310 95 Wellington Street W Toronto, ON M5J 2N7

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:23/03/2023

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  ResolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I had a RRSP GIC with Peoples Trust that was due to renew on March 12, 2023. You can not set renewal options online or by email. I tried to phone them on multiple occasions. Each time I was put on hold for an extended period of time (***** minutes) only to then be forced to leave a message. With each of the calls, I either did not receive a call back or they called at random times 2-3 days later when I was at work and do not have access to my phone. Due to this I finally sent in a letter of direction as well as a transfer form indicating my wish to have the funds transferred to my ************* RRSP savings account. I mailed this form in 4 weeks prior to the renewal date.The day after the renewal date I went in online only to discover that they had reinvested the money with their company for another GIC against my expressed wishes. I called and emailed the company multiple times and did not even get a response back until 5 business days later! I was then informed in an email that the form I sent them was inadequate and to contact them. After another series of frustrating attempts I finally was able to discuss the situation with a representative. He informed me that I needed to send a "signature guaranteed" form from ********. I have sent this exact same form (downloaded directly from the ******** site) to other companies such as Oaken Financial and ******* without any issue.I asked him why no one had contacted me in the at least 3 weeks that they had the form to let me know that they required this "signature guaranteed" form and why instead they went ahead and reinvested my money against my expressed consent. He could not give me any satisfactory answer for this except to say the department that received the documents was "too busy" to respond (THEY HAD THEM FOR 3-4 WEEKS!) so they didn't let the other department know not to renew the **** I immediately contacted my financial advisor and had a signature guaranteed form sent to them. It has been another 3 business days and yet the funds are still not transferred and I have not heard back from the company. I am beyond frustrated with this company and want my funds transferred out immediately.

  

  Business Response

  Date: 27/03/2023

  We are very sorry to hear about your experience and can only apologize for not following up on your multiple contacts. Please rest assured that it was never our intention to ignore your request to have your RRSPs transferred to another institution: I note that you have sent us a transfer from back in February and that not providing a response for such a long time is clearly unacceptable and not reflective of our usual standards. While we are experiencing delays due to the high volume of contacts, 3-4 weeks is excessive and the answer you were given was completely inappropriate. I would like to reassure you that the agent was given appropriate coaching to avoid such mistakes from happening in the future and we are doing our very best to improve our service and restore normal response time.  Regarding your transfer, I would like to confirm that everything has been processed per your request last Thursday and this should be only a matter of days before you see your investments with ********. Once again, apologies for this poor experience and thank you for taking the time to share your feedback.

  Kind regards,

  Peoples Trust 

  Customer Answer

  Date: 29/03/2023

  
  

   

  Complaint: ********
  
  I am rejecting this response because: I am glad that your company is admitting that they were negligent and that the service I received was substandard. As a result of this negligent and substandard service your company has now had my money in your possession for over 2 weeks without it earning interest. Despite the fact that you claim to have released the funds last Thursday, they are still not in my ******** account when I checked at the end of the day today!

  As this is due to your admitted negligence I wish to be compensated for the lost interest. Interest on ********** at 5% for a 16 day period amounts to $229.21. Your company needs to pay me this amount to compensate for my loses due to your admitted subpar customer service.

  And why has the money not yet in my ******** account? It should have been a priority of your company to expedite this transfer given the issue was caused by your negligence!
  
  Sincerely,
  
  *******************

  

  Business Response

  Date: 05/04/2023

  We have confirmed with ******** that they received your RRSP transfer that we sent March 23rd,and they will deposit it shortly. In terms of your request for compensation of interest, we have calculated the amount at a higher rate of ****% as that was the rate at the time of your RRSP renewal. A Cheque for $238.98 has been mailed April 4th to ******** via ************ Once again, we appreciate your patience and for bringing this matter to our attention.
  
  Kind regards,

  Peoples Trust

  Customer Answer

  Date: 05/04/2023

  
  Better Business Bureau:
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me.
  
  Sincerely,
  
  *******************

• Initial Complaint

  Date:13/03/2023

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  ResolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I've been a customer of Peoples Trust *** **** ** ***** *** I have never been treated so badly and with so much disrespect. On Feb 27, 2023 I purchased RRSP for about $4,000.00 online. I tried to call Peoples Trust but they wouldn't take any phone calls because they were busy and they encouraged the customers to purchase online, which I did. At the end of the online application I was advised to mail the cheque to their physical address in BC. The next day, Feb 28, I mailed the cheque to them. ****** *** ******** ***** ** ** ******* *** ****** ** *** **. I still had 2 more days to the deadline of purchasing RRSP. However, Peoples Trust emailed me on Mar 8 (10 days after my opening the account) stating my RRSP was opened on Mar 8. This is very unfair as in order to be able to use the RRSP for my income tax filing, the RRSP had to have a date before Mar 2. I called them right away and I spoke to Rai at length, I explained my concern and he said that they might be able to change the date but he would need to speak to "admin" first and that he would be getting back to me the same day (Mar 9). He never got back to me. I then called again on Mar 10 but they were busy again and the automated system said someone would call me back, I waited all day and no one called me back. I called again on Monday, Mar 13 (as they have no customer service on the weekend) and this time I spoke to Steven. He was rude, interrupting me, not letting me explain the reason why I was calling and he said that he would also get back to me after "reviewing my conversation with Rai." Steven did call back this time only to tell me they decided not to change the date for me because of the interest. I explained that I don't want any interest on those days, I just need to be able to use it for my income tax and that it's not fair that peoples Trust took so long to cash my cheque and that there was ABSOLUTELY NO NOTE in the online application that the account would be opened only as of the date when the cheque is cashed. He had no empathy, no understanding. * ******** *** **** * **** **** * ******** ** ******* ***** *** **** **** ** ***** *** ** ****** ****** **** ***** ***** I would really appreciate your help with this, it is really important for me to use my RRSP contribution for 2022. Thank you.

  

  Business Response

  Date: 16/03/2023

  Good day,

  We are very sorry to hear about your experience and the service received not
  reflective of our usual standards.  Please note that we normally process
  applications when we receive the funds and not on the date a cheque is being
  issued: we have a reference on the application form stating clearly that the
  deposit is needed prior to activating an account.  I understand that you
  have done your very best to have your RRSP contribution processed before the
  deadline and can understand how frustrating it can be as you have reached out
  for assistance multiple times. Based on these circumstances and the poor
  experience you had with our representative, we were happy to process your
  request as a one-time exception as discussed with our Senior Manager Customer
  Success today. In the future, it is recommended to avoid processing RRSP
  contribution at the very last minute in order to meet the March 1st deadline. We hope that we could restore your confidence with Peoples Trust and
  would like to thank you for sharing your feedback.

  Peoples Trust Customer Success Team

  Customer Answer

  Date: 16/03/2023

  
  
  Better Business Bureau:
  
  
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me.
  
  
  
  
  Sincerely,
  
  
  
  ********** ******

  Thank you so much for your support!

• Initial Complaint

  Date:22/02/2023

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  ResolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I open an account with Peoples Trust sometime in mid 2019. I also purchased a GIC in September of 2019. I believe I have not not done any online banking with them since probably March 2021. I believe this caused my account to go dormant. Just recently I tried to go online to do some banking with them and it would not let me and told me to contact by phoning them. I tried several attempts and you leave a message for them to get back to you and they never do. Right now I have some money there that I cannot access and want to but cannot.

  

  Business Response

  Date: 22/02/2023

  Good day,

  We are very sorry to hear about your experience and can only apologize for not returning your call earlier. Please note that during this busy RRSP season, we are experiencing higher than normal call volumes and are doing our very best to respond to each customer. We completely understand that we should be able to respond to urgent banking queries faster and we will do our very best to improve our service in the future. In the meantime, one of our representatives will give you a call as soon as possible so we can unlock your account: you are correct, an account becomes inactive when you are not using your online banking for 12 months.Thank you again for your patience and for taking the time to share your feedback.

  Kind regards,

  Peoples Trust Company, part of Peoples Group

  Customer Answer

  Date: 23/02/2023

   
  Better Business Bureau:
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me.
  
  Sincerely,
  
  *********************