MSE News: Don't let retirement apathy cost you thousands

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This is the discussion thread for the following MSE News Story:
"Around 60% of elderly people accept their pension provider's annuity plan, which is likely to be a grave financial error ..."
"Around 60% of elderly people accept their pension provider's annuity plan, which is likely to be a grave financial error ..."
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Dont rely on the FSA tables to decide your annuity purchase. They use too many assumptions and you often find the real life figures are different and the order of companies comes out different. Use it only as a guide but thats all. IFAs cant use it as its so unreliable. You often find the best company is one that is not listed or if it is, it comes out in third place on the FSA tables but top in real life.
We covered that recently on the forums. The way moneyfacts have published the information is to make the figures sound a bit sensationalist in the media. When you look more closely at annuity rates going back to 1991, you will see the drops occurred mostly between 1991 (where a 65 year old male could get £14,430 on £100k fund) to 1999 when it was £8876. Since 1999, annuity rates have had much less decline and largely followed interest rates. 2005 was the low point ( £7302)before they started rising again (to 7879) until last year where they took a decline because interest rates where £6615 is now the figure.
to be scrapped be scrapped.. someone needs to press delete.
Orlando Money Savers
I wanted to compare other annuities with the one offered annually by my stakeholder pension company.
I was told by the YIG adviser I spoke to last year that it would cost me £500 to get an annuity quote from him.
Why does it cost so much and how can I compare 5 or 6 different deals at those sort of charges?
Are annuities so very difficult that I wouldn't understand?
Was that because he did it on nil commission basis?
It's up to you how you pay. If you dont want to go fee basis then go commission.
Some will retail direct but they just keep the commission they would pay the IFA for themselves. Some choose not to retail direct because its not cost effective for them to do so. If you set up to retail direct to public you have further cost implications under solvency requirements as well as compliance costs.
You go to the supermarket to buy your food. You dont go to each manufacturer directly to buy the food. Annuities are much the same.
The first of the female 'baby boomers' were old enough to retire in 2005!