Personal Finance

Anyone with experience with Knowledge First Financial - RESP??

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  • Nov 11th, 2023 11:58 pm
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Nov 18, 2007
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There is nothing about any KFF plan that has "similar attributes to a bank self directed plan".

I open a bank RESP. I put money in. Invest as desired. Take money out when my child starts their first 13 weeks of school. No worries about taking a year off for travel. No worries about co-op courses that interrupt continuous studies. No worries about taking 1 year, 2 year, 3 year, 4 year, 5 year programs. Your money is your money.

Please people, avoid these scholarship plans. Nobody knocking on your door or cold-calling you is trying to save you money.
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Aug 29, 2001
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WikkiWikki wrote: Same in fact two we are done contributing so the money sits. I fill out the forms correctly until they go to school. The third we are still contributing to.

We signed up for this stuff pre internet. Its going to be what its going to be. Life lesson maybe, time will tell. To late to do anything about it now
I'm still waiting for the money to get deposited. tick tick...
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WikkiWikki wrote: 1996 is when we started and we had no clue. We wanted to just start a regular savings account and go from there. All their math and info seemed valid, and that they did all the grants for us, etc. Which they did.

I review each statement from eahc kid, and there is more money in there than we paid them. So unless something weird happens on withdrawel, it all seems valid.

But if this is happenign more and more, Ill bet there will be lawsuits against these companies, class action or something
I think a scholarship plan like this would have given OK returns if you had started in the 90s because interest rates were quite a bit higher then and you would have seen bond prices go up quite a bit as interest rates were cut many times from there past the late 2000s. So your plan would have been somewhat OK. Bonds had done very well if you were sitting on thems from the mid 90s. Mind you, you would have to compare a bond fund from the 90s to today to see a proper assessment of what returns you could have gotten instead to assess it for what it is and I would think that going the bank route instead of the group plan would have likely come out ahead.

The big problem now is that there is so little yield on bonds and with interest rates going higher in the short, medium term, there is little upside to see.
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xgbsSS wrote: I think a scholarship plan like this would have given OK returns if you had started in the 90s because interest rates were quite a bit higher then and you would have seen bond prices go up quite a bit as interest rates were cut many times from there past the late 2000s. So your plan would have been somewhat OK. Bonds had done very well if you were sitting on thems from the mid 90s. Mind you, you would have to compare a bond fund from the 90s to today to see a proper assessment of what returns you could have gotten instead to assess it for what it is and I would think that going the bank route instead of the group plan would have likely come out ahead.

The big problem now is that there is so little yield on bonds and with interest rates going higher in the short, medium term, there is little upside to see.
Well to late now. Two kids are going to school next fall, and no more money is going in their RESPS anyway. And our youngest is 16 and we are still putting in until he goes to school, or he turns 20, just like the other two. We kept putting in the same amount after into a bank resp with no fees at all.

We will see when we "cash them in" what happens. We have moved them over t the correct plan so they aren't so locked in, and have to do that annually if they don't go to school

Cant turn back time, cant be in control of everything. Basically we did what we thought was right.
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WikkiWikki wrote: Well to late now. Two kids are going to school next fall, and no more money is going in their RESPS anyway. And our youngest is 16 and we are still putting in until he goes to school, or he turns 20, just like the other two. We kept putting in the same amount after into a bank resp with no fees at all.

We will see when we "cash them in" what happens. We have moved them over t the correct plan so they aren't so locked in, and have to do that annually if they don't go to school

Cant turn back time, cant be in control of everything. Basically we did what we thought was right.
No for sure! You did what any loving parent would do at the time. It not really a loss, and likely just a mediocre return in total. I hope your dealings with them go smoothly .
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Aug 29, 2001
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How long until they typically payout? I've been waiting 3 weeks since faxing in the forms.
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xgbsSS wrote: No for sure! You did what any loving parent would do at the time. It not really a loss, and likely just a mediocre return in total. I hope your dealings with them go smoothly .
So do I, they have been taking our money know for over 2 decades, so lets see when we ask for it back
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So how does this RESP thing with them work? I put in an initial $4K 18 years ago. Today I got a check addressed to me for $3K (4K - 1K for their ridiculous fees). what about the rest?
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rilles wrote: So how does this RESP thing with them work? I put in an initial $4K 18 years ago. Today I got a check addressed to me for $3K (4K - 1K for their ridiculous fees). what about the rest?
So in all these years, you never once received a statement from them, and email, a phone call. You just gave them 4K and didnt keep track of it or ask questions, ever?
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WikkiWikki wrote: So in all these years, you never once received a statement from them, and email, a phone call. You just gave them 4K and didnt keep track of it or ask questions, ever?
Got statements, I know the balance and this year sent in the forms to redeem for my kids education and spoke to them on the phone. I don't understand why I now have a check for less then what they are supposed to give me. Is this typical or do I have to call them yet again?
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rilles wrote: Got statements, I know the balance and this year sent in the forms to redeem for my kids education and spoke to them on the phone. I don't understand why I now have a check for less then what they are supposed to give me. Is this typical or do I have to call them yet again?
So the statements shows what, how much was made in 18 years on 4K. Because then not only did you lose 1K off the principal, you lost 18 years of interest to
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"For group plans, EAPs are paid in installments over the course of your student’s qualified studies. They start the
year after the plan matures. The student must qualify to receive an EAP each year"

Being my first effort at using an RESP, I don't know if banks are the same as this or not. Not sure how they arrive at the specific $$ amount per year, but it took a few calls to understand.. support seems to always be on a noisy line with people that have thick accents.
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rilles wrote: "For group plans, EAPs are paid in installments over the course of your student’s qualified studies. They start the
year after the plan matures. The student must qualify to receive an EAP each year"

Being my first effort at using an RESP, I don't know if banks are the same as this or not. Not sure how they arrive at the specific $$ amount per year, but it took a few calls to understand.. support seems to always be on a noisy line with people that have thick accents.
With a regular bank RESP you're only limited on EAP for the first 13 weeks of studies. After that you can draw out all the EAP money. This is good because if your kid drops out in year 2 or 3 you can still have taken out all the EAP by then.

One more reason why scholarship trusts are garbage and unnecessarily restrictive.
Money Smarts Blog wrote: I agree with the previous posters, especially Thalo. {And} Thalo's advice is spot on.
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Thalo wrote: With a regular bank RESP you're only limited on EAP for the first 13 weeks of studies. After that you can draw out all the EAP money. This is good because if your kid drops out in year 2 or 3 you can still have taken out all the EAP by then.

One more reason why scholarship trusts are garbage and unnecessarily restrictive.
Agreed. Garbage. First year you get your initial deposit back (minus the ridiculous fees), then whatever else you deposited and gains are divided by how many years left and paid out over the span of the remaining 3 years.
They empathized 4 year term alot.. so I assume if your kid goes to college or does a 3 years degree you get your initial deposit back and the rest is whooshed.
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Sep 16, 2018
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Unfortunately, I learned the hard way that these people tell you one thing and then do another. They have scammed my husband and I out of a lot of money and they are saying our accusations are without merit. We would have never found out had it not been that I had to request for our plan to be paused because I had health issues and couldn’t keep making the payments. These people are awful. They tell you that they’ll keep most of your money and that you can either get the little they offer you back or get that same little bit transferred over to a different plan with lower payments. No option to get the bigger chunk of your money back at all.
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Oct 3, 2018
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Thanks to this thread I am not signing up an RESP with this company. I will be going through my bank 100%. Seems like there are a lot of problems receiving money and losing money to fees with this group plan. My banks interest rate return is muchanged higher then this rate anyways.
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Well, sent in the official form and acceptance letter for our oldest son today. First time, so will see how it goes, how much money was "lost" or if its all a-ok

Hard to turn back time, this was setup almost 22 years ago, although we have stopped giving money a few years ago.
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Other then their overpriced fees, I have been getting my money back after jumping through the paperwork hoops
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rilles wrote: Other then their overpriced fees, I have been getting my money back after jumping through the paperwork hoops
We have religiously filled out every maturity form, change of type of plan, etc all these years. Every grant was applied as well.

Fees are fees, we got this pre-internet, so we used what knowledge we had. Such is life, cant turn back time

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