I trusted this lady as she was very experienced in the world of finance, and had worked at NatWest, a reputable brand, for a very long time. She knew about my tragic personal circumstances and I genuinely thought she was trying to do her best for me.
Following this conversation I looked up Chris Byrne, a former NatWest adviser, and his newly established firm, Lumiere Wealth. I thought it seemed like a safe bet, and it was exactly what I was looking for. Following a meeting with him, I decided to invest £400,000, which was a huge sum of money for me.
At first it seemed like my investment was doing well, but then when I wanted to access my money, I was told I wasn’t able to. To cut a long story short, Lumiere Wealth turned out to be a Ponzi scheme and I lost all my money. In 2018 Chris Byrne was sentenced to seven years in prison for 14 counts of fraud and one count of knowingly providing false information to the Jersey Financial Services Commission.
I complained to NatWest and although it agreed that the lady I’d spoken to on the phone had behaved inappropriately, it said it was not prepared to pay me a penny of compensation. I was so distraught by the incident on top of losing my husband that I put the pain inside a box and hid it at the back of the metaphorical wardrobe. But after reading a recent article of yours, my ordeal came back to me, and I thought maybe you could help, if it’s not too late?
– Anon
Dear reader,
As the managing director of Lumiere…
