DB Transfer
ex-pat_scot
Posts: 692 Forumite
And so I join the ranks of those seeking information and advice on transfer of my DB scheme into my SIPP.
The TVAS in June 2015 was £69,000.
The TVAS received today is just over £101,000.
As such, I am comfortably in the range in which transfer advice is required, and will need to use a pensions transfer specialist.
I am aware that the costs (and advice) can vary tremendously, and would like to understand what a decent price for the work might be, and any anecdotes / recommendations from recent transfers.
My SIPP is with Alliance Trust, and they will only accept transfers where positive recommendation has been received.
(I could open a AJ Bell account, who merely require that advice has been sought, and use them as a second account, then transfer out into AT later).
Any practical pointers?
The TVAS in June 2015 was £69,000.
The TVAS received today is just over £101,000.
As such, I am comfortably in the range in which transfer advice is required, and will need to use a pensions transfer specialist.
I am aware that the costs (and advice) can vary tremendously, and would like to understand what a decent price for the work might be, and any anecdotes / recommendations from recent transfers.
My SIPP is with Alliance Trust, and they will only accept transfers where positive recommendation has been received.
(I could open a AJ Bell account, who merely require that advice has been sought, and use them as a second account, then transfer out into AT later).
Any practical pointers?
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Comments
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Why are you transferring your pension to a SIPP? Have you compared the income and benefits of the two arrangements?“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”0
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Several reasons:
1. impaired health
2. ability to access the funds @55 if in DC, vs significant actuarial reduction if accessed via DB @55
3. flexibility and alignment with my existing DC funds and investment strategy0 -
I'd expect the advice to cost up to £1000. I paid that a year ago for advice on two pension transfers.
Expect to have to spend an hour with the IFA at the outset and an hour to receive their recommendation.The comments I post are my personal opinion. While I try to check everything is correct before posting, I can and do make mistakes, so always try to check official information sources before relying on my posts.0 -
ex-pat_scot wrote: »Several reasons:
1. impaired health
2. ability to access the funds @55 if in DC, vs significant actuarial reduction if accessed via DB @55
3. flexibility and alignment with my existing DC funds and investment strategy
Poor health does make a DB pension potentially a bad deal and longevity is always the trickiest parameter in any forecast. But consider that a DB pension can be a nice diversifer if you have DC funds and it's good to do the actuarial calculation to see at what age the two plans cross over.“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”0 -
You may wish to look at the thread below for some pointers on fees.
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=72280296&postcount=15
I am in the latter stages of transferring a DB pension and am using Intelligent Pensions as IFA to effect the transfer into a SIPP. The whole process has taken about 3 months. Charges are £1k +VAT for the TVAS and report (paid in advance) plus 1% of the transferred sum upon completion. (If I wanted the IFA to manage the funds going forward the x'fer fees are lower and there is the ongoing charge).
Although I already have a SIPP with Hargreaves Lansdown, they told me they were not willing to accept funds where the IFA had completed the TVAS Report and did not recommend transferring the DB Pension. (As you know) A J Bell are willing to accept transfers in from 'insistent customers'.
I'm not sure how ill health would affect your IFA's recommendation but in my situation I know the TVAS calcs themselves did not 'point' to a positive recommendation; my move was supported because I made a written 'case' to the IFA to support my application setting out a whole range of factors such as: other income (key here was the fact that the DB Pension is not central to my retirement needs), expenditure during retirement, attitude to risk etc. On the latter point, you may want complete the Fina Metrica on-line self-assessment that gives some indication of your attitude to (financial) risk.0 -
impaired health
Are you eligible to take the DB pension without AD on grounds of ill health?0 -
What is your DB Pension worth today? Mine was £2500 per year with RPI to a maximum of 5% and 50% spouce payment in death. I transferred mine with a CETV of £67,000. TVAS Report was free and transfer was 3% (£2000). It was an old deferred pension and not my main retirement needs, but I got a positive recommendation anyway. After your IFA transfers it, you can then transfer it to your SIPP. My 1st DB transfer took 3 months to transfer to Aviva, who then sent me a 30 days 'change your mind letter', so it was 4 months before I could log in to see funds. I then tried to change the funds to a more higher risk and Aviva said I had to contact IFA or write a letter, so I just transferred it to my current Standard Life Pension which took around another 3 weeks to complete. My 2nd DB as mentioned above (£67k), has taken 5 months to transfer into a Royal London pension. I've just received log on details and I like the portfolio set up but the IFA has put an ongoing charge of 1% on top of Royal London's charge of 0.45%, when we had agreed a charge of 0.65%. So looks like I will be transferring this one to my current Standard Life Pension Fund as well!!0
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You may wish to look at the thread below for some pointers on fees.
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=72280296&postcount=15
I am in the latter stages of transferring a DB pension and am using Intelligent Pensions as IFA to effect the transfer into a SIPP. The whole process has taken about 3 months. Charges are £1k +VAT for the TVAS and report (paid in advance) plus 1% of the transferred sum upon completion. (If I wanted the IFA to manage the funds going forward the x'fer fees are lower and there is the ongoing charge).
Although I already have a SIPP with Hargreaves Lansdown, they told me they were not willing to accept funds where the IFA had completed the TVAS Report and did not recommend transferring the DB Pension. (As you know) A J Bell are willing to accept transfers in from 'insistent customers'.
I'm not sure how ill health would affect your IFA's recommendation but in my situation I know the TVAS calcs themselves did not 'point' to a positive recommendation; my move was supported because I made a written 'case' to the IFA to support my application setting out a whole range of factors such as: other income (key here was the fact that the DB Pension is not central to my retirement needs), expenditure during retirement, attitude to risk etc. On the latter point, you may want complete the Fina Metrica on-line self-assessment that gives some indication of your attitude to (financial) risk.
Thanks. Intelligent Pensions were the first I thought of, but have agreed this week with the regulator to stop doing transfer advice.
I have the supporting information you note, thanks; it will be a similar approach I will take I think.0 -
Intelligent Pensions were the first I thought of, but have agreed this week with the regulator to stop doing transfer advice.
I understand they are looking to re-start DB transfers once they have agreed on the nature of the guarantees (my word) the regulator wants over the type of funds the DB monies will be moved into. Is this your understanding?
Who will you be using now then?0
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