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Setting up a new personal pension - help me choose!
I took redundancy at the end of December and I would like to maximise my pension contribution for the current tax year. Since so can no longer pay into my old workplace scheme I need to choose a new pension provider and scheme. i have calculated (with a lot of help from this forum!) that I have £12.5k of my 2024/25 salary…
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Bonds question
Prior to the Truss mini budget, I believed that bonds were a safe place to place wealth into (particularly as company pension schemes tend to rebalance in favour of bonds as retirement age approaches). I recall that just after the infamous fiscal event, there were concerns pension funds were being wiped out by the rapid…
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Accessing 25% tax free lump sum
Hi, I've done a lot of reading on this and I think I've got this figured out. Just wanted to confirm with you all. I've just turned 55. I have a few defined contribution pension pots at various pension companies (Aviva, Legal and General, Royal London etc) that I accumulated over the years while working for multiple…
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Pension Tracker
I am looking for an app or even a spreadsheet to track the values and chart the progress of my various personal pension plans in the one place. Bonus points if it can include the state pension as well. Does such a thing exist?
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Growth assumptions in your models/spreadsheets
Interested to see how others do their growth modelling and what numbers they use for things like global equity funds, UK property, Gold, Bonds, etc. Up to now my modelling has simply used plug-in single figures for different asset classes, and I've been using conservative values. I am modelling the next 30 years (ages 56…
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TFLS across DB & DC Pensions
Hi I currently have both a DB final salary and a DC Lifesight (AVC's) scheme through my current employer. I have the option when I retire (I'm 54 and can take my DB benefits from 50) hopefully soon to transfer my Lifesight funds back into my DB part to fund the TFLS. Currently this is about £285k and I would select the…
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Retirement flat
All I want to say is think twice, actually think more than that if you are thinking of buying a retirement flat. Having going through the process of selling my parents it’s an awful process. Hard to sell, the bills go up and up, the fees are ridiculous and just been given a £10,000 sinking fund fee. They lost so much money…
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LGPS pension account modeller and early retirement deductions
Hi all, I'm a long way from retirement (32yo) but want to make sure I understand the LGPS correctly. My salary is circa £65k and I contribute 8.5% from my salary into the LGPS. I joined the LGPS at 24 and would like to retire at 60 with 36 years service. I also pay into a SS AVC to reduce 40% tax and plan to take this in…
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State pension forecast, does this mean what I think it does?
My wife's just left her job. She has 4 years to go to get to pension age and doesn't intend to carry on working. Her forecast on the gov site give her weekly/monthly forecast and says, 'You cannot improve your forecast any more.'Does that mean that she doesn't have to carry on paying NI through voluntary contributions, or…
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Advice needed on choice of IFA
I'd be grateful for any advice that can be offered by those more expert than me regarding the choice I have between two different IFAs for initial investment advice and ongoing advice on my DC pension pots. I'll be 60 this summer and am aiming to retire then, with the option to do bits of freelance work if I need to. I…
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Help
Hi all So i have worked all my life and unffortunately had to retire due to ill health in 2020. My NHS pensions restricts me from earning any more than the LEL(£6,398 currently) so National insurance will not be deducted from my earnings ever. I know there are 3 ways to get national insurance credits. I cannot afford to…
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R85 pension
I am 60 years old. I have worked part time in schools for 25 years and have a LGPS. It has been agreed that I can reduced my 3 days working week to 2, and reduce my 52 weeks to a 38 week contract with my wages being paid over 12 months. I have spoken to pensions dept about taking Flexible Retirement and I would be covered…
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Pension Age raise
I am very confused re state pension. It says I can take it in mid July 2027 but understand there will be another age increase. I was born 1960
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Pension Buy Out timeline
I’ve just been told that one of my deferred DB pensions is being wound up with a full buy out. This doesn’t seem to be particularly bad news. However, the timeline has the handover to the insurance company happening around the same time as my 60th birthday when the pension comes into payment. Should I be worried about…
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Nest Pension
I pay £100 a month into nest from my bank account. Would it make any difference to pay from my salary for tax purposes? My employer would not be contributing any more.
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Partner wants to pay AVCs via Standard Life.
Good morning all, My partner works for a local authority, has a decent pension package, and various risk-based investments including the usual multi-asset funds in SIPP and ISA. She has just slipped into the 40% income tax bracket and wants to try to offset this. So she is planning to purchase an AVC pension. She can take…
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Frequency of state pension payments
Thought it might be worth sharing this snippet of information. Dwp present payment of the state pension as if every 4 weeks is the default position with no other options. However, after receiving my letter last year to claim my state pension, I phoned the number thereon to see if I could get it weekly in the same way as…
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DB Transfer 'extortion' ?!
Well... We (my wife & I) have started on the road of withdrawing the full amount that is sat in her NatWest Group Pension from working there in the 1980's. Note: I have already done this process for 3 old pensions I tracked down and fully withdrew my funds in all 3 (they were under £30k so all good). We went through the…
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Overpayment fault
I was paid out by a local government for death of my cousin from his pension. It took over two years to pay it out. I’ve now had it over four months and they’ve written ‘requesting’ me to return nearly £4k as they realised they’ve overpaid me. Now the sticky part, firstly, I’ve spent it, secondly I don’t have it anymore.…
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Help deciding how best to use pension options (international citizen)
Hiya, I am in my early 30s. I have done a PhD, which means that I don't have many full years contributing to NI or a pension fund, and I want to get back on track for pension planning and then some in the coming few years. Some info: * I have four years fully paid NI; three years no paid NI; four years partially paid. * Of…
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