No idea about pensions

carly

What advice would you give to a 27yr old female about financial planning for the future. In employment but no company pension scheme on offer. Owns a flat ( mortgaged ) no dependants and salary about to increase to allow a small amount of disposable income, possibly £100 to £200 per month.
Where's the best place to look and how do you know who to trust?

dunstonh

Where's the best place to look and how do you know who to trust?

Your choices are really DIY or use an IFA. Avoid all other methods (e.g. banks, sales reps etc).

If you know what you are doing and how you want to invest then going DIY is fine. If you dont know what you are doing or how to invest then its better to use an IFA.

Loughton_Monkey

The important thing is to start a pension. Although very trite, there was a BBC article yesterday:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11876535

You are currently at the 'thin' end of contributions, and you might find very few IFA's can cost effectively advise you fully.

Personally I would hate to steer you in any particular direction, but I believe you could do a lot worse than going with a good 'household name' pension. Look specifically at the charging rate (which they will have to quote somewhere) and you may find what you want in the 'stakeholder' category, but are just as likely to find it in the non stakeholder variety.

Others may also have suggestions, but if I were buying another pension directly for myself, I would look at the following providers [forgive me, not knowing whcih ones don't deal direct with the public] all of whom I would tend to trust:

Scottish Widows
Aviva
Legal & General
Aegon
Skandia
Fidelity
Prudential

coyocacan

Carly - my advice would be to get doing something quickly; but work back from what you need to have available to you when you retire. Please do not underestimate the amount of money you will need to live anywhere close to the standard you enjoy now. Do not equate some savings with making the right level of provision!

As Loughton Monkey has said, take a close look at the big household names; you can't go too wrong with these.

Come back and tell us when you have set a plan up!

Good luck.

kidmugsy

In your shoes I'd probably open a cash isa to take the £100 - £200 per month, and build up a "rainy day" fund. During the months it's building up (target, say, 3 months or more of after-tax earnings) I'd take the opportunity to learn about pensions while under no pressure to act precipitately.

DavidLaGuardia

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

Personally I would hate to steer you in any particular direction, but I believe you could do a lot worse than going with a good 'household name' pension.

Fair enough, get into a pension ASAP and there are enough plans out there to start one up which is the imortant thing.

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

Others may also have suggestions, but if I were buying another pension directly for myself, I would look at the following providers

Ok, but I though you weren't going to "steer them"

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

[forgive me, not knowing whcih ones don't deal direct with the public].

But yet you felt obliged to random select some pension providers.

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

all of whom I would tend to trust:.

Why do you trust them? How many of these have you had regular dealing with? Or if you are honest, is this just a case of sticking to some old canard that household names are somehow like magic pixie dust?

Loughton_Monkey

DavidLaGuardia wrote: »

Ok, but I though you weren't going to "steer them"

I said steer in any particular direction.

DavidLaGuardia wrote: »

But yet you felt obliged to random select some pension providers.

Why do you trust them? How many of these have you had regular dealing with? Or if you are honest, is this just a case of sticking to some old canard that household names are somehow like magic pixie dust?

It was not random. I listed companies - many of whom I have had dealings with, and which (if you can read) I said I would use "personally". Hence just clearly stating my own opinion.

I can only guess, that by pouncing upon a 3½ week old post in such a venemous way, you either got out of bed the wrong side this morning, or you have an old Canard, some Pixie Dust, and a slice of lemon up your 4rse. Which of the two is it?