Mutual funds can be held in the physical form or in the demand form. In both the physical common in the demand form the mutual funds are managed electronically. So, there is not much difference between the physical form and the demand form. However, when the mutual fund holdings have to be transferred from the investor to the legal heir, in the case of the investors depth, the D mat account has some benefits over the physical form. When mutual funds are held in the demand form, only the D mat account needs to be transferred and all the mutual funds under that D mat account will be transferred to the legal heir. However, in the case of physical form of holding mutual funds, each individual major fund from the AMC each individual AMC has to be transferred individually from the investor to the legal heir.
And this can be very cumbersome. banks in India have come out with an intermediary solution which they offer. The investment Services account. Now the Investment Services account holds the mutual fund in physical format. However, it provides the same facilities as the demand for format would provide. We will discuss this in some more details.
So, what is an investor Services account? My investor Services account is an account offered by the banks through which investor can purchase and sell mutual funds and keep his holdings in the mutual fund. Now, the investor Services account can be opened by giving a fee and normally the Investment Services account charges a quarterly fee for to the investor. The banks provide an option under the net banking facility where the investor Services account details can be seen and using the same interface the investor can buy and sell mutual funds in his account. When the investor has an investor Services account. I say the banks regularly provide some inputs regarding where the investor can invest When and where the investor needs to sell his positions.
The ISI can be only used to buy and sell mutual funds. When I investor holds mutual funds in our investor Services account, the mutual funds are held in the physical format. However, there is a major advantage because now the answer is a the investor can nominate the person. Though, however, the nomination can be only made for one person. Nevertheless, though, when the main in the case of investors death, the entire investor Services account holdings is transferred to the nominee on producing the necessary documents. So is a takes away the disadvantage or investor would have if holding the mutual fund in a physical format.
However, there is one major disadvantage of investor Services account. Using a virtual Services account investors can only purchase mutual funds in regular plans. It is not possible To purchase mutual funds and direct plan using there is a because here the banks always act as an intermediary.