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Are you a client? You should contact your private banker. 
You are not a client but would like to have more information about Societe Generale Private Banking? Please fill in the form below.

Local contacts

France: +33 (0)1 53 43 87 00 (9am - 6pm)
Luxembourg: +352 47 93 11 1 (8:30am - 5:30pm)
Monaco: +377 97 97 58 00 (9/12am - 2/5pm)
Switzerland: Geneva +41 22 819 02 02
& Zurich +41 44 218 56 11 (8:30am - 5:30pm)

You would like to contact us about the protection of your personal data?

Please contact the Data Protection Officer of Societe Generale Private Banking France by sending an email to the following address: protectiondesdonnees@societegenerale.fr.

Please contact the Data Protection Officer of Societe Generale Luxembourg by sending an email to the following address: lux.dpooffice@socgen.com.

For customers residing in Italy, please contact BDO, the external provider in charge of Data Protection, by sending an email to the following address: lux.dpooffice-branch-IT@socgen.com

Please contact the Data Protection Officer of Societe Generale Private Banking Monaco by sending an email to the following address: list.mon-privmonaco-dpo@socgen.com

Please contact the Data Protection Officer of Societe Generale Private Banking Switzerland by sending an email to the following address : ch-dataprotection@socgen.com

You need to make a claim?

Societe Generale Private Banking aims to provide you with the best possible quality of service. However, difficulties may sometimes arise in the operation of your account or in the use of the services made available to you.

Your private banker  is your privileged contact to receive and process your claim.

 If you disagree with or do not get a response from your advisor, you can send your claim to the direction  of Societe Generale Private Banking France by email to the following address: FR-SGPB-Relations-Clients@socgen.com or by mail to: 

Société Générale Private Banking France
29 boulevard Haussmann CS 614
75421 Paris Cedex 9

Societe Generale Private Banking France undertakes to acknowledge receipt of your claim within 10 (ten) working days from the date it is sent and to provide you with a response within 2 (two) months from the same date. If we are unable to meet this 2 (two) month deadline, you will be informed by letter.

In the event of disagreement with the bank  or of a lack of response from us within 2 (two) months of sending your first written claim, or within 15 (fifteen) working days for a claim about a payment service, you may refer the matter free of charge, depending on the nature of your claim, to:  

 

The Consumer Ombudsman at the FBF

The Consumer Ombudsman at the Fédération Bancaire Française (FBF – French Banking Federation) is competent for disputes relating to services provided and contracts concluded in the field of banking operations (e.g. management of deposit accounts, credit operations, payment services etc.), investment services, financial instruments and savings products, as well as the marketing of insurance contracts.

The FBF Ombudsman will reply directly to you within 90 (ninety) days from the date on which she/he receives all the documents on which the request is based. In the event of a complex dispute, this period may be extended. The FBF Ombudsman will formulate a reasoned position and submit it to both parties for approval.

The FBF Ombudsman can be contacted on the following website: www.lemediateur.fbf.fr or by mail at:

Le Médiateur de la Fédération Bancaire Française
CS 151
75422 Paris CEDEX 09

 

The Ombudsman of the AMF

The Ombudsman of the Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF - French Financial Markets Authority) is also competent for disputes relating to investment services, financial instruments and financial savings products.

For this type of dispute, as a consumer customer, you have therefore a choice between the FBF Ombudsman and the AMF Ombudsman. Once you have chosen one of these two ombudsmen, you can no longer refer the same dispute to the other ombudsman.

The AMF Ombudsman can be contacted on the AMF website: www.amf-france.org/fr/le-mediateur or by mail at:

Médiateur de l'AMF, Autorité des Marchés Financiers
17 place de la Bourse
75082 PARIS CEDEX 02
FRANCE


The Insurance Ombudsman

The Insurance Ombudsman is competent for disputes concerning the subscription, application or interpretation of insurance contracts.

The Insurance Ombudsman can be contacted using the contact details that must be mentioned in your insurance contract.

To ensure that your requests are handled effectively, any claim addressed to Societe Generale Luxembourg should be sent to:

Private banking Claims department
11, Avenue Emile Reuter
L-2420 Luxembourg

Or by email to clienteleprivee.sglux@socgen.com and for customers residing in Italy at societegenerale@unapec.it

The Bank will acknowledge your request within 10 working days and provide a response to your claim within 30 working days of receipt. If your request requires additional processing time (e.g. if it involves complex research), the Bank will inform you of this situation within the same 30-working day timeframe.

In the event that the response you receive does not meet your expectations, we suggest the following:

Initially, you may wish to contact the Societe Generale Luxembourg Division responsible for handling claims, at the following address:

Corporate Secretariat of Societe Generale Luxembourg
11, Avenue Emile Reuter
L-2420 Luxembourg

If the response from the Division responsible for claims does not resolve the claim, you may wish to contact Societe Generale Luxembourg's supervisory authority, the “Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier”/“CSSF” (Luxembourg Financial Sector Supervisory Commission):

By mail: 283, Route d’Arlon L-1150 Luxembourg
By email:
direction@cssf.lu

Any claim addressed to Societe Generale Private Banking Monaco should be sent by e-mail to the following address: servicequalite.privmonaco@socgen.com or by mail to our dedicated department: 

Societe Generale Private Banking Monaco
Middle Office – Service Réclamation 
11 avenue de Grande Bretagne
98000 Monaco

The Bank will acknowledge your request within 2 working days after receipt and provide a response to your claim within a maximum of 30 working days of receipt. If your request requires additional processing time (e.g. if it involves complex researches…), the Bank will inform you of this situation within the same 30-working day timeframe. 

In the event that the response you receive does not meet your expectations, we suggest to contact the Societe Generale Private Banking Direction that handles the claims by mail at the following address: 

Societe Generale Private Banking Monaco
Secrétariat Général
11 avenue de Grande Bretagne 
98000 Monaco

Any claim addressed to the Bank can be sent by email to:

sgpb-reclamations.ch@socgen.com
 

Clients may also contact the Swiss Banking Ombudsman: 

www.bankingombudsman.ch

 

Myth: life insurance is not a good investment after 70

Article up to date at 1 November 2020, drafted in accordance with French legislation in force, and applicable to individuals whose tax residence is in France.
 

Article 990 I of the French tax code permits an allowance of €152,500 in death benefits per beneficiary at a tax threshold of 31.25%. However, the death benefits linked to the premiums paid into a life insurance policy after age 70 are not entitled to these provisions. Should one therefore systematically rule out paying into a life insurance policy after 70? Read on.

 

Life Insurance policy in a nutshell

A life insurance policy is an investment vehicle that allows you to accumulate income and make withdrawals. Should you decide to partially redeem your policy, only the share of interest earned on that redemption is taxable. Let’s say you took out a policy three years ago and invested €1,000K in it, and that today that amount is worth €1,150K. Assuming that you redeem the equivalent of the unrealized capital gain, i.e. €150K gross, only €20K will be taxed(1). There will therefore be a tax cost of €6K (30% flat tax excluding the possibility of an exceptional tax on high income and unless opting for the progressive scale for income tax), and the net redemption amount will be €144K.  In other words, life insurance is first and foremost a capitalisation vehicle for investing liquid assets under sound conditions.

Transferring death benefits

Life insurance is also used for succession purposes: upon the policyholder’s death, regardless of his or her age, the ownership of the proceeds of the policy are transferred to the expressly designated beneficiary or beneficiaries — who may or may not be heirs of the deceased. Indeed, by law the death benefits received by one or more beneficiaries are not considered as assets of the policyholder’s estate. That said, life insurance should not be used as a means to disinherit one’s heirs, as premiums deemed as manifestly excessive risk being included into the estate! To make full use of life insurance as an instrument for transferring one’s wealth, special attention needs to be paid to how the beneficiary clause is drafted rather than automatically approving the standard clause prepared by the insurer. A more personalised and perhaps more sophisticated clause drafted with the help of an expert may prove to be particularly effective.

What is the differents made between payments made before 70 and after 70 from a tax perspective?

The taxation on death benefits linked to the premiums paid before the policyholder turns 70 may at first seem more attractive than the taxation on premiums paid after 70:

  • In the first case, death benefits are excluded from estate assets, and are included in the second case;

  • There is an allowance of €152.5K per beneficiary in the first case, versus a total allowance of €30.5K in the second case;

  • In the first case a specific levy with a 31.25% marginal rate of is applied, whereas in the second case inheritance tax with a 45% marginal rate is applied for direct-line beneficiaries, and a 60% marginal rate for third-party beneficiaries

Remember that for payments into your life insurance policy after 70, only the amount of premiums paid are subject to inheritance tax. However, the proceeds of the life insurance policy are exonerated from inheritance tax. So, depending on your objectives, having a life insurance policy after 70 could prove a very worthwhile strategy.

Example: Life Insurance after 70 as tool for transferring your estate to your grandchildren (2)

Earlier we saw how parties who are not considered heirs of the estate can be designated as beneficiaries in the policyholder’s life insurance policy. Therefore, provided a clause has been adequately drafted to this effect, the policy can be used to transfer liquid assets to the policyholder’s grandchildren who can benefit, where applicable, from the progressive scale on inheritance tax rates (5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, 30% above €550K, then 45% above €1,800K). For example: a 71-year-old policyholder wishes to invest in one year €1,000K that she plans to leave to her four grandchildren after her death. She passes away four years later. The policy is now worth €1,500K thanks to the investment products. Each grandchild receives €375K.

  • If the initial amount had been invested in a securities account, for instance, the €1,500K would have been considered as an estate asset and therefore included in the inheritance tax calculation. If, by way of a testamentary provision, the deceased had bequeathed this asset to her grandchildren, the cost would be approximately €75K, leaving each grandchild with €300K net(3)

  • However, if the initial amount had been invested in a life insurance policy, the grandchildren would only be taxed on the total of the premiums paid (i.e. €250K per policy):

  1. After an allowance of €30,500 for all the premiums paid after the age of 70;

  2. With application of the of the direct-line inheritance tax scale (with various allowances, if not used elsewhere)

The cost would therefore be limited to approximately €48K per grandchild who will have €327K to put towards their life plans. Therefore, dismissing life insurance after 70 on the grounds that it is not a good investment is not a sound argument. At Societe Generale Private Banking, a Wealth Engineer is ready to assist you alongside your Private Banker in defining a bespoke strategy to achieve your objectives.

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(1) Amount of partial redemption — All premiums paid up to the date of the partial redemption x (Amount of partial redemption/Total value of redemption on the date of the partial redemption), i.e. 150 — (1,000 x 150/1,150).

(2) Excluding manifestly excessive premiums.

(3) Application of the direct-line inheritance tax scale after an allowance of €1,594 per grandchild on the value of the asset, i.e. €375K.

Would you like to discuss this subject further with us?

The information provided on this page is for information purposes only and has no contractual value. The content of this page is not intended to provide investment advice or any other investment service and does not constitute an offer, a personalised recommendation or advice from Societe Generale Private Banking with a view to the purchase or subscription or sale of investment services or financial products.

The information contained on this page does not constitute legal, tax or accounting advice. The information contained herein is provided for information purposes only and is intended to provide the reader with information that may be useful in making a decision. It does not in any way constitute personalized recommendations. The reader should not use it as an investment recommendation or as legal, accounting or tax advice. All of the asset management strategies envisaged will require the validation of your usual legal and tax advice before being implemented.

This article is based on sources that Societe Generale Private Banking considers reliable and accurate at the time of writing. All information contained in this document is subject to change without notice. No Société Générale Private Banking entity can under any circumstances be held liable for any decision taken by an investor on the basis of this information.

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