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I posted a while back asking about annual management charges but have been pretty happy to keep my existing arrangements ticking over since then. Not sure if there’s any big benefit by consolidating/moving to be had at this time other than making it easier to track. 
 

I now have:

3 private defined contribution pensions (currently £37k + £7k + £5k)

1  current public sector defined benefit pension accruing £1k pa, sitting at approx. £4K so far (4 years in) and to be adjusted for inflation each year.

1 AVC pot (defined contribution) of approx. £4K pa building alongside my public sector pension. 

Age 38 and hoping the public sector pension continues for the foreseeable. Certainly no plans to move. 

My 3x private, plus 1x AVC are my plans to bridge the gap from 68 down to retirement age as early as possible. Leaving the public sector pot at its full value until 68. 

Do any of our resident TAMB pension experts think that’s on right track or am I missing anything? 

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 10/13/2021 at 7:49 PM, AlfieMoon said:

I posted a while back asking about annual management charges but have been pretty happy to keep my existing arrangements ticking over since then. Not sure if there’s any big benefit by consolidating/moving to be had at this time other than making it easier to track. 
 

I now have:

3 private defined contribution pensions (currently £37k + £7k + £5k)

1  current public sector defined benefit pension accruing £1k pa, sitting at approx. £4K so far (4 years in) and to be adjusted for inflation each year.

1 AVC pot (defined contribution) of approx. £4K pa building alongside my public sector pension. 

Age 38 and hoping the public sector pension continues for the foreseeable. Certainly no plans to move. 

My 3x private, plus 1x AVC are my plans to bridge the gap from 68 down to retirement age as early as possible. Leaving the public sector pot at its full value until 68. 

Do any of our resident TAMB pension experts think that’s on right track or am I missing anything? 

typically if you are no longer an employee, if you have legacy employer schemes, you no longer are entitled to the discounted management fees, + likely there are quarterly fees you are triplicating  across all 3 funds + the 3 funds if employer are likely limited to a number of funds - ie I removed from my employer pension choice of 8 to open architecture where i have choice of 8,000

take a look at www.iii.co.uk, and consider if you want to consolidate pensions + I bet you don't review those pensions very often and move around + at your age should be going aggressive on equity  - i'm a pedantic fecker - i look daily on my pension to see the trend on the individual funds, and even track quarterly the one's i exited  to validate i made correct choice

I've started looking 10-15 years down line, and the Total LIfetime Allowance of GBP 1 Million starts to get concerning if they keep freezing that.  

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54 minutes ago, euan2020 said:

typically if you are no longer an employee, if you have legacy employer schemes, you no longer are entitled to the discounted management fees, + likely there are quarterly fees you are triplicating  across all 3 funds + the 3 funds if employer are likely limited to a number of funds - ie I removed from my employer pension choice of 8 to open architecture where i have choice of 8,000

take a look at www.iii.co.uk, and consider if you want to consolidate pensions + I bet you don't review those pensions very often and move around + at your age should be going aggressive on equity  - i'm a pedantic fecker - i look daily on my pension to see the trend on the individual funds, and even track quarterly the one's i exited  to validate i made correct choice

I've started looking 10-15 years down line, and the Total LIfetime Allowance of GBP 1 Million starts to get concerning if they keep freezing that.  

Thanks Euan - makes sense! 👍

I’ve recently started trending my 3 legacy plans against each other to see how they’re comparing. Already seeing which is weakest and building some data before I take any action. Not quite as pedantic yet, but trying to get to your level. 😂

A couple of my providers still allow transfer in but with quite limited fund options which is something you touched on. Will look at iii as suggested but don’t think my current fees merit that platform yet. I am very much in for equities as you suggest.
 

It would be nice to have the £1m ceiling to worry about 😂 .. not quite sure I’ll make it there even with the 20x DB calculation to be factored in. I’d need some pretty impressive DC growth coupled with a decent promotion / salary jump to boost DB pot. 

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2 hours ago, AlfieMoon said:

Thanks Euan - makes sense! 👍

I’ve recently started trending my 3 legacy plans against each other to see how they’re comparing. Already seeing which is weakest and building some data before I take any action. Not quite as pedantic yet, but trying to get to your level. 😂

A couple of my providers still allow transfer in but with quite limited fund options which is something you touched on. Will look at iii as suggested but don’t think my current fees merit that platform yet. I am very much in for equities as you suggest.
 

It would be nice to have the £1m ceiling to worry about 😂 .. not quite sure I’ll make it there even with the 20x DB calculation to be factored in. I’d need some pretty impressive DC growth coupled with a decent promotion / salary jump to boost DB pot. 

iii.co.uk are around 250 a quid a year in fee's for a SIPP  -nothing beyond that other than your own choice of fund (ie Fundsmith, Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust & their own underlying management fees  )   i think my old employer fund was around 0.3% or something like that  that employer paid  - 

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looking at my 5 year growth from July 16, with no additional contributions i am looking at 110% growth 

putting in context given other folks are mentioning pots - my main pot which i removed from employer scheme (+ my defined benefits pot) have grown from 196K to 410K in those 5 years  - kind of waiting for some sort of crash again, but considering as lifetime pension with all equity even getting into my 60's & 70's, so never going conservative, and have 20-30 years to ride out peaks and troughs, maybe 40-50 years if consider wife is 15 years younger than me       

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On 10/13/2021 at 7:49 PM, AlfieMoon said:

I posted a while back asking about annual management charges but have been pretty happy to keep my existing arrangements ticking over since then. Not sure if there’s any big benefit by consolidating/moving to be had at this time other than making it easier to track. 
 

I now have:

3 private defined contribution pensions (currently £37k + £7k + £5k)

1  current public sector defined benefit pension accruing £1k pa, sitting at approx. £4K so far (4 years in) and to be adjusted for inflation each year.

1 AVC pot (defined contribution) of approx. £4K pa building alongside my public sector pension. 

Age 38 and hoping the public sector pension continues for the foreseeable. Certainly no plans to move. 

My 3x private, plus 1x AVC are my plans to bridge the gap from 68 down to retirement age as early as possible. Leaving the public sector pot at its full value until 68

Do any of our resident TAMB pension experts think that’s on right track or am I missing anything? 

forgot to say - just my opinion but that is too late to draw down on defined benefits final salary - you never know tomorrow's health, and how healthy would you be at that age to enjoy the money - in addition average age of life is 82, and a lot of people pass earlier, so based on average age you are only getting 14 years out of it, and even then, when likely health may not be the most premium -

one of the considerations i had on my final salary scheme was that i thought i could grow the money quicker than the inflationary matching increase - over 5 years this would have been around say 12% increase inflationary inside the defined benefits, and have grown that pot, i removed from final salary by 110% -sometimes you are better off getting the money early, and doing something with it 

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9 hours ago, euan2020 said:

forgot to say - just my opinion but that is too late to draw down on defined benefits final salary - you never know tomorrow's health, and how healthy would you be at that age to enjoy the money - in addition average age of life is 82, and a lot of people pass earlier, so based on average age you are only getting 14 years out of it, and even then, when likely health may not be the most premium -

one of the considerations i had on my final salary scheme was that i thought i could grow the money quicker than the inflationary matching increase - over 5 years this would have been around say 12% increase inflationary inside the defined benefits, and have grown that pot, i removed from final salary by 110% -sometimes you are better off getting the money early, and doing something with it 

My current thinking is that I’d be pretty hesitant to move the DB pot in future. I have my risk averse portion of my brain assigned to my DB. 
 

I’m happy to see how much DC I can build in order to bridge down to early retirement at 57-60 but there’s a long way to go and lots of variables. If I can get a big enough DC pot then I can leave my DB until 68 + SP. At current accrual rate I would get to £24k pa DB + £9k SP in today’s money. A lot can change though with jobs/family so I’ll have a better idea where I stand in 10 years (48) and start thinking about financial advice at that stage to give due consideration to things like shifting the DB pot. 

Edited by AlfieMoon
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1 minute ago, AlfieMoon said:

My current thinking is that I’d be pretty hesitant to move the DB pot in future. I have my risk averse portion of my brain assigned to my DB. 
 

I’m happy to see how much DC I can build in order to bridge down to early retirement at 57-60 but there’s a long way to go and lots of variables. If I can get a big enough DC pot then I can leave my DB until 68 + SP. At current accrual rate I would get to £24k pa DB + £9k SP in today’s money. A lot can change though with jobs/family so I’ll have a better idea where I stand in 10 years (48) and start thinking about financial advice at that stage. 

yes - keep DB pot - i was more discussing accessing it before befo6re 68 = there is reason they pay out more at that age, cos they are banking on your dieing so less exposure of payout  

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51 minutes ago, euan2020 said:

yes - keep DB pot - i was more discussing accessing it before befo6re 68 = there is reason they pay out more at that age, cos they are banking on your dieing so less exposure of payout  

Yeah, it is tipped towards them paying less - especially west of Scotland with lower life expectancy! 🙈 

I think I’m fortunate that I’ve a good balance of DC & DB that should give me options in years to come. 

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  • 4 months later...
On 11/5/2021 at 1:18 PM, euan2020 said:

looking at my 5 year growth from July 16, with no additional contributions i am looking at 110% growth 

putting in context given other folks are mentioning pots - my main pot which i removed from employer scheme (+ my defined benefits pot) have grown from 196K to 410K in those 5 years  - kind of waiting for some sort of crash again, but considering as lifetime pension with all equity even getting into my 60's & 70's, so never going conservative, and have 20-30 years to ride out peaks and troughs, maybe 40-50 years if consider wife is 15 years younger than me       

down 20% since November, so back to around 70% growth since 2016 

Kind of crazy times - I sold my 2019 Wrangler in December 21  for 10% more than i paid brand new in 2019 - sold to BMW

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  • 5 months later...
On 9/1/2022 at 9:12 PM, EddardStark said:

Got this very small pension pot worth £1300 from a previous employer. Not sure if its worth transferring to my private pension ( the larger one) or my civil service one which I have had for 3.5 years. I am 58 and looking at retiring at 65. Any suggestions ? 

It'll be getting eaten away at with management fees i'd imagine?

I'd transfer it into your larger. 

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58 minutes ago, Squirrelhumper said:

It'll be getting eaten away at with management fees i'd imagine?

I'd transfer it into your larger. 

Probably. Or ping it into Pension Bee. I've been quite happy with my own smaller pension in there. Easy for you add a wee top up or to take a wee bit out, including your 25% tax free amount if you want it. 

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  • 1 year later...
On 12/28/2020 at 5:51 AM, TDYER63 said:

A year ago I got an IFA to look at cashing in one of my final salary pensions. I had 2 final salary pensions, none of them large and even combined would not have been enough for me to retire on without other savings or waiting for my OAP to kick in. Thankfully I did have some savings plus my husband have a private pension, albeit even smaller than either of my final salary pensions, so the IFA made an application. I wasnt however looking to manage the funds myself , I have neither the experience or inclination to do this. The IFA were linked to a company I was happy enough with. 
It was quite a robust process and the company knocked me back as they said my outgoings were too extravagant and couldn't recommend me leaving the guarantees the final salary scheme offered. I wasn't happy as I had thought long and hard about this transfer out and for all the same reasons you have mentioned. The problem was my outgoings , but even a final salary scheme wouldnt have covered them , therefore I didnt see what difference was.

I reapplied this year , reigning in my expenditure. One final of my salary pensions was offering me 28 x salary to transfer out, the other was 44 times. It was a no brainer as to what pension I wanted to move from. This year I was accepted. The investment company look to see how much it would cost to purchase the same pension and when they looked at the cost of the more generous 44 x salary offer it was not much more to buy a similar product in the market so recommended i move out of this one. They would have rejected me again on the 28 x salary pension . 

I think you may find it difficult to get an IFA who is not linked to a company. It is very difficult to move out these schemes these days due to the mis-selling that has gone on in the past. I paid about 1.5 % for all the costs. My IFA didnt charge me anything last year as he felt he should have perhaps helped guide me better on the expenditure. 
As it happens he did me a favour as I was only getting offered 30 x times the final salary last year. 

I will ask my IFA if he knows anyone who will look at the transfer on its own, but be really careful . 13% moves in these current whippy markets is to be expected , but it could easily move the same amount in the opposite direction.  I think you are quite a bit younger than me right enough and can probably withstand large swings,  but don't get caught up in short term trends. 

think you caught fortunate there - apparently the buy outs are now 30% lower due to the cost of servicing final pensions being currently lower due to higher gilt rates  

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On 3/13/2022 at 12:56 PM, euan2020 said:

down 20% since November, so back to around 70% growth since 2016 

Kind of crazy times - I sold my 2019 Wrangler in December 21  for 10% more than i paid brand new in 2019 - sold to BMW

80% Growth since 2016 - last 2 years been poor and marginal recovery - 2022 reduced 21% 

drove effectively for free for 5 years bought 2 new wranglers (2019 and 2022) and sold them for the same money i had paid for them 

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8 hours ago, euan2020 said:

think you caught fortunate there - apparently the buy outs are now 30% lower due to the cost of servicing final pensions being currently lower due to higher gilt rates  

‘Fortunate’ is most definitely the word to describe it as opposed to me being a financial mystic meg. 

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3 hours ago, TDYER63 said:

‘Fortunate’ is most definitely the word to describe it as opposed to me being a financial mystic meg. 

yeh - 44 was a high one  - think mine was only at 22 multiplier in 2016 - either/or - and a strange one to say - but i am better off out of my final salary pension scheme - have been able to grow it quicker than the inflationary increase - i'm still pounding away into my USA pension  

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19 hours ago, euan2020 said:

yeh - 44 was a high one  - think mine was only at 22 multiplier in 2016 - either/or - and a strange one to say - but i am better off out of my final salary pension scheme - have been able to grow it quicker than the inflationary increase - i'm still pounding away into my USA pension  

Moving out the DB scheme was a good move, the annual pension it provided would never have been enough for me to retire and now I have a reasonable amount of money that I can access when I need it, not when I am too old to spend it. However if I had worked somewhere for a long time and the DB scheme was providing a decent income I probably would not have moved it. It was an easy choice for me as it was only a few thousand pounds a year . 

I have gone down to working 3 days a week since January. Best thing I have ever done. I enjoy my job more now I only have to do it 3 days and the fact I am not sitting at a desk for 8 hours a day has made me feel healthier too. I now just sit on this board for 8 hrs a day boring the arse off everyone. 

I haven’t had to use my pension yet as I still have enough coming in to get by and my husband is still working full time. We both plan to chuck it completely at the end of this year but he worries about money and is scared we wont have enough. I worked out the annual income I realistically think we will need and added in a bit extra to allow for unexpected outgoings . We should have enough so long as Liz Truss doesn’t get reelected and this year we are living off what we will have to live on annually going forward , to ensure that we can do it.
So far so good, though it’s only the start of February and we still have the Euros to pay for. That dosh is coming out of the ‘ unexpected outgoings ‘ pot 😆 

Edited by TDYER63
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1 hour ago, TDYER63 said:

I'd be surprised if it even exists at all (defo won't in it's current format) by time i hit state pension age. Born in 1984. I'd rather opt out it and put the pensions contributions in my NI into my private pension. Will never happen as they rely on folk never reaching state pension age having paid into it for 40 odd years. 

Fuck being in manual labour intensive jobs at 70.

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2 hours ago, TDYER63 said:

Another topic that worried the older population re Independence, even though DWP confirmed in 2013 (I think) that they would carry on paying it. Folk like my mum were worried and didn't understand that it's more likely there won't be a pension for my generation onwards! Some still believe NI contributions go into a nice big pot all ready for when you retire...

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8 hours ago, Squirrelhumper said:

I'd be surprised if it even exists at all (defo won't in it's current format) by time i hit state pension age. Born in 1984. I'd rather opt out it and put the pensions contributions in my NI into my private pension. Will never happen as they rely on folk never reaching state pension age having paid into it for 40 odd years. 

Fuck being in manual labour intensive jobs at 70.

Yep it's ridiculous. I'm 1989 so no fat behind you.

I'm intent on knocking my pan in for the next 15 years working for myself and retiring by 50, maybe 55 depending how good or bad things go.

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