Do financial firms do enough to help people who have retired?

Former_MSE_Wendy · 23 February 2014 at 5:40PM

Age UK has set up a financial services commission to look into how financial firms can help older people cope with money matters.

It wants to hear your thoughts and tales

The charity for the elderly frequently hears from people about the problems they face with finance – and all too often financial institutions seem to add to the problem, rather than provide solutions that really work for people.

Do you think the financial services industry should be doing more to help people better able to cope with whatever money issues life throws at them?

Have you struggled to find the best home for your savings?

Have you good or bad experiences of buying an annuity?

How could things improve?

Tell Age UK what you think and it will use your stories to push for change from regulators, the government and the financial services industry over the next few months.

lucylou32 · 27 February 2014 at 3:49PM

I work for a financial advisor's and we offer this (Annuity) service to everyone.

My understanding is (i don't work in that section myself) around 12 months before you retire, we contact you (providing you've asked us to of course) there's a few other steps and then, your pension provider gives you an offer. We then carry out a free of charge whole of market review. If we find an offer that increases your income (the average increase in income we find is around 30%) then we ask for a % of that (the extra money we've found you) to cover the work carried out. If we can't find you anything better, there's no cost involved.

To me, this seems like an amazing service, you're guaranteed not to lose money (since no fee's unless a higher income is offered) but are very likely to make more money. However, we get so few people using our service, because they assume it's going to cost them loads !!!

I say, everyone should use this service when they're coming up to retirement, i mean... an extra 30% added to your income.....

pollypenny · 28 February 2014 at 10:07AM

I was annoyed that the Prudential would give no projected figures for my AVC until they were informed by the Teachers'Pension Agency that I was retiring imminently.

After I retired they sent figures based on advance payments, while stating that payments in arrears would be more.! They would not give figures over the phone.

Coincidentally, there was a postal strike, the eventually figures they sent were the same as their original . Annuities were going down, so the upshot was that I was forced to take their figure.

Generally unhelpful .

PennyForThem_2 · 2 March 2014 at 2:45PM

We went to an IFA. Best thing we ever did as sorted out husband's pension via annuity and also our bits of non-financial planning pots of various monies and organised them into some sort of harmony. Could not have done this on our own.

We came late to IFA but I would advise anybody with any sort of savings to bite the bullet. Yes, there is a charge, but at least it is up front and if you want advice then they are there to give it.

Sophie-1 · 8 April 2014 at 9:44PM

An independent financial advisor is the best place to go for advice. Be careful of some banks and building societies as sometimes they only want to sell you their products regardless of whether it what you need. I experienced this with my mother.

Do financial firms do enough to help people who have retired?

Comments

Categories

Get our FREE Weekly email full of deals & guides - and it’s spam-free