10 ways to boost your pension

AlexPQM

Interesting article for all of you who want to know what to do about your pensions.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/pensions/8240243/10-ways-to-boost-your-pension.html

Old_Slaphead

AlexPQM wrote: »

Interesting article for all of you who want to know what to do about your pensions.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/pensions/8240243/10-ways-to-boost-your-pension.html

I like No 3.

How to increase your pension ? - Save more.

Doh - never thought of that !

greyteam1959

Thats a bit like the advice about insulating your house..........
Shut the curtains !!!!!
Must have taken a real genius to work that one out.

AlexPQM

mervyn11 wrote: »

Thats a bit like the advice about insulating your house..........
Shut the curtains !!!!!
Must have taken a real genius to work that one out.

Well, sometimes you need to state the obvious to get through to some people.

dunstonh

Couple of things on the article

4: Do it yourself. You don’t need to hope an insurance company knows what it’s doing; you can run your own retirement fund. Everyone, including members of company schemes, is now allowed to have a Self Invested Personal Pension (SIPP).

How does that boost your pension?

The Telegraphs paid for advertising of SIPPs is getting a bit tiresome. They shouldn't be allowed to be influenced by their advertisers.

7: Top up company or personal pensions with Additional Voluntary Contributions (AVCs). Mike Warburton of chartered accountants Grant Thornton explained: “This is the simplest and most effective way cut your tax bill and increase your retirement fund.”

Many schemes no longer offer AVCs and those that are left are often not the most effective way to cut your tax bill and increase your retirement fund. What are they doing asking an accountant for his view?

10: Don’t forget the wife. Seven in 10 married men buy single life annuities, which means their widows will receive no payments – and it is usually the man who goes first. Dr Altmann has called on regulators to intervene in what she claims is a bigger scandal than Equitable Life but women could protect their interests by taking more interest in pensions here and now.

Don't forget the wife is a good concept (although in some cases it could be don't forget the husband). However, Ross Altmann has opened her gob again without thinking first. How can consumers choosing how they want their annuity be a scandal, let alone one bigger than Equitable Life?

savemoney

I am sure most of us would like to save more or pay more we get this drummed into us almost every week on media

In the real world many of us just have enough more to get by this is slowly getting eroded by an inept and uncaring government who almost daily with there polices are attacking the poorest of society the most.

nrsql

>> 4: Do it yourself.
Possible, but pensions are the one area where I want a professional to keep up with the legislation and tell me when things have changed and affect my situation. Most other things I consider I am probably better placed to make my own decisions but pensions carry far too much risk.

JoeCrystal

3: Save harder. A simple rule of thumb for people wondering how much they should save for retirement was devised by Adrian Boulding, a director of Legal & General. Boulding’s Law states that if you want a pension equal to two thirds of your final salary, your annual pension contributions expressed as a percentage of earnings should always equal half your age when you started saving.

Huh? And here I was thinking it was between 20% to 25%... Still fun to read though.

Cheers

Joe

jamesd

Paying attention to your investments and picking better ones is something they somehow managed to miss, even though investment choice is critical to getting good results.

3: Save harder.
7: Top up company or personal pensions with Additional Voluntary Contributions (AVCs).

Seems they were running out of ideas and thought that save harder needed to be in there twice.