lgp what age can she clain it?

sporty1

Hi not sure if i amwording this right but basically,my friend is 60 this year,and she has worked for local council for over approx 15 years and paid into LGP scheme, the question is
1. if she rdecided to finish work earlier than the retirment age (65 i think), can she claim her pension,?? or do you have to wait untill a certain age before you can claim it (cash it in whatever the wording is ? ).
so basically if she left work this year at age of 60
or next year etc, can she get her pension,

2.. does it make a difference if she finished voluntery just because she wanted too ?/
3.. what happens if there were voluntery Reduncansies and she took that , does that make a difference to when she could get her pension
3.. Its mainly the 1st option she was thinking of ie just finishing work now she is 60 this year.
Thanks in advance but she needs a little advice , and i dont know the answers either to help her,
thanks

JOHNGT

For the England and Wales LGPS

She can claim it from 55 but needs her employer's permission if she takes it before 60

Pension will be reduced by 23% and lump sum by 12% if she takes it at 60

You can get an unreduced pension if you satisfy the rule of 85. This adds your age of retirement to your years of service, and if it is over 85 you get an unreduced pension on early retirement. For your friend, that is 60 + 15 = 75, so she doesn't qualify for an unreduced pension under this rule.

No difference if she stops work voluntarily

If there was a redundancy deal she may be offered an unreduced pension so she ought to hang on if that is a possibility

downshifter

Tell her to get in touch with the pension scheme provider (mine was Tameside which covers lots of the Manchester and district local authorities) They will send her information about all the options available to her. She may also have a pensions adviser working for her authority. The other thing is that her pension provider will have been sending her a statement every year, this also sets out the options as well as all the contact details. She will have options about whether to divert some of the monthly payments into a lump sum (which I did) or make the monthly payments bigger and take a smaller lump sum. It will all be clearly set out for her. They actually sent it all out without me asking, around 6 weeks before my 60th birthday. If she hasn't been receiving annual statements then maybe she forgot to tell them she had moved at some point?

Although I left a while ago I was able to take mine out in Feb this year, when I was 60. I lost a very small amount because I took it early but it's certainly been worth it, with the lump sum I paid off all outstanding debts and there is a worthwhile amount which will land in my bank every month for as long as I live!

If there are likely to be redundancies it might be worth looking into that, a friend of mine put in his resignation and 2 weeks later voluntary redundancies were announced but because he had resigned just before they came in, he lost around £5000 enhancement. He's not that bothered as that's just the luck of the draw, but worth doing what she can to find out whether that's likely to happen where she is.

Hope that helps

DS