N Sundaresha Subramanian

Mumbai: Newer fund houses are pulling new tricks out of their hats to make their mark in the competitive MF battlefield. In a first in the industry, Bharti AXA Investment Managers has come up with an eco plan on its maiden scheme, offering an incentive to investors choosing to go paperless.

The scheme, Bharti AXA Equity Fund, is awaiting Sebi approval.

“This Plan is aimed at retail investors who would prefer to receive all communications in electronic form, reducing paper consumption and thus promoting practices that helps in conservation of environment by avoiding use of paper and saving trees,” says the offer document.

While other fund houses have an email option, this is the first time a fund house is offering a monetary incentive through a separate plan at the offer document stage itself.

In order to encourage retail individual investors to opt for the eco plan, the recurring fees will stand reduced for investments up to Rs 2 lakh, says the offer document.

Sandeep DasGupta, CEO, Bharti AXA Investment Managers told DNA Money, “Very often, we find investors receiving bulk of documents like monthly reports, dividend orders, etc. In families where there are multiple folios the amount of paper is even more. Opting for statements through email will lead to significant cost reduction, which we want to pass on to the investor. Therefore, for retail investors choosing this plan, the expense ratio will be lesser by 25 basis points.”

The fund house will publish separate net asset values for the eco plan, Sandeep Dasgupta added.

For an investor taking this option, it will be compulsory to provide an email address at the time of investment. All communication, including account statements, annual reports, portfolio statements and statutory information, will be sent in soft copy format to this address only.

Dividend and redemption payments will be made only by way of direct credit ECS/RTGS/NEFT to their registered bank mandate.

Investors can choose this plan for investments up to Rs 2 lakh. All purchases in excess of Rs 2 lakh will be automatically, and without any reference to the unit holder, be placed under the regular plan under the same folio, with the same options and preferences as chosen under the eco plan.

Where due to redemption, the investment value in eco plan falls below Rs 2 lakh, fresh purchases (other than by way of SIP/STP) to that extent can be made by a unit holder in the eco plan, and by giving fresh instruction for SIP/STP.

All communications to the unit holder having an eco plan folio would continue to be sent in electronic format (e-mail, SMS, etc). Investors (subject to eligibility) are free to choose any of the two investment plans (eco or regular), as per their requirements, as the scheme is open-ended and allows switching from one investment plan to another, subject to the prevailing terms of the relevant investment plan.

For all unit holders under the eco plan, the refunds will be made by way of direct credit into their registered bank accounts.

Source : DNA