HSBC UK STAFF PENSION CLAW BACK on retirement

GreatGoose

So HSBC stopped the DBS to new entrants - but not satisfied with that they used the Ageism laws in 2009 as an excuse to meddle again by insisting that members of the DBS work an extra 5 years...or...contribute an increasing amount of DCS to protect their retirement date and final salary...not content with that.... today they announce that they are stopping accruals of DBS from July 2014 effectively making it a deferred pension. The excuse this time to make it equitous with other workers who are on DCS; not by increasing their benefit but by attacking the benefit of the remaining 25% of staff who have long service. Assuring them that it is not a 'cost cutting' measure. Oh.. and taking two days holiday away from their entitlement.

Tomthumb123_2

Great goose - and don't forget the fact that sick pay is now only payable in full for 26 weeks!! Shafted by the greedy !!!!ers!!

kidmugsy

If you don't like the terms of your employment, change jobs.

As for your unions, they could hardly be worse than mine was on pensions.

ermine

by insisting that members of the DBS work an extra 5 years...or...contribute an increasing amount of DCS to protect their retirement date and final salary.

AFAIK contract law doesn't allow them to change benefits already accrued. The same thing happened where I worked changing the normal pension age from 60 to 65 but they could not change the terms for the years I had accrued up to the date of change. The change therefore didn't matter much to me as the post-change years are only a small part of my accrud pension.

There is no law saying you have to retire at the normal pension age for your company. You can retire whenever you want. You just have to take matters into your own hands and save enough money to bridge the gap. In my case this was saving in ISAs and AVCs. In nearly all cases retiring early means spending less, possibly permanently. It statnds to reason, because you kiss goodby to all the money you could have earned if you hadn't retired early. Spending less scares the bejesus out of most people, as they gradually ratchet up their spending as comfort for...having to work for - overdemanding sociopathic employers.

Spending less is a fantastic trade. After retiring early from work I don't miss all the consumer tat that I bought to make up for the fact that work was crap (it was originally a fantastic place to work but went wrong over the years, sounds like your description of HSBC). I'm still working out how to use half the gadgets I bought mindlessly while I was at work. I don't need to fly to exotic holidays for two weeks to make up for the remaining fifty weeks of misery. Every day is a vacation when you own your own time, and you can take time over holidays which makes them cheaper anyway.

Think outside the box. It's YOUR life. Choose how you live it. It doesn't have to be the same as the usual work 40 years and then retire. But you have to master what the resources are available to you and then deploy them according to your values. Forty years at the coalface wasn't right for me. It's right for other people. Live life - your way. If you want to retire earlier, spend less. It really is that simple. If you aren't prepared to make the spending changes in order to do that, then accept your lot or see if you can improve your salary, but for God's sake SAVE the difference towards your early retirement.

The trouble with the human condition is we live in a world indifferent to us. The world doesn't care if you get what you want. HSBC is part of that world - all it wants is the value of the work that you do, it doesn't care about you whatever the corporate platitudes say - action speaks louder than words. You are in charge of getting what you want, and the world, quite frankly, doesn't give a damn. I had endless pain and hurt from my sense of entitlement until I got that. Then it started going right...

traineepensioner

ermine,

Excellent advice. :beer:

I came to a similar conclusion regarding increasing consumer spending and the sacrifices required to fuel it. I decided that life's too short to keep doing something I no longer enjoyed just for money's sake.

OK, I've now got less money than before but I've more time for living and no regrets so far

SooziJane

kidmugsy wrote: »

If you don't like the terms of your employment, change jobs.

As for your unions, they could hardly be worse than mine was on pensions.

I do like the terms of my unemployment, unfortunately HSBC doesn't like them so much!

In reply to Newbie's original message - Clawback applies to anyone in the DBS who joined after 1974. What is even more shocking is that Females have more clawed back than males even though our state pension ages have been equalized. Also, my State Pension Age is 66 but I have clawback deducted from the HSBC pension at age 60 and then some more at age 65. Apparently it's all written into the pension scheme terms.

Not many employees realise this so any employees reading this please spread the word.

StevieJ

SooziJane wrote: »

I do like the terms of my unemployment, unfortunately HSBC doesn't like them so much!

In reply to Newbie's original message - Clawback applies to anyone in the DBS who joined after 1974. What is even more shocking is that Females have more clawed back than males even though our state pension ages have been equalized. Also, my State Pension Age is 66 but I have clawback deducted from the HSBC pension at age 60 and then some more at age 65. Apparently it's all written into the pension scheme terms.

Not many employees realise this so any employees reading this please spread the word.

I can't quite get my head round that one, I can understand the point about clawback leaving your pension the same, before and after state pension age but to action the clawback six years early is barbarous, although I suppose they would argue that the finances of the pension scheme relating to you were set up based on the original retirement ages. The have known for a long time about the female increase to retirement age, enough time to make some adjustments.

Kath54

I have spoken with Unite (the union) about this as there is also an inequality side, as females suffer the reduction in pension at an earlier stage than men. I think initially the deduction would have come at the time we received our State Pensions however as the pension age has been put back, the 'clawback' is deducted at the time we would have received our State Pension not when we do receive it.

gropinginthedark

Be glad that you are in a final salary DBS, barely anyone in the private sector is any more. Schemes became prohibitively expensive to run as life expectancy increased and Gordon Brown changed the taxation regime on pension funds costing them approaching £200,000,000,000. Newer employees of HSBC are in a much worse position too. Many other DBS schemes don't have enough money to continue paying existing scheme members pensions and some have collapsed - pension payments may then be protected (to some extent) by the PPF but that gets its money by a levy on other private pension schemes (which doesn't seem very fair on them).

The economic elephant in the room is public sector pension schemes. They still pay out as generously as the final salary private sector DBS schemes did - to employees who (unlike many private sector) work strictly 9:00-5:00, take more days sick leave on average than private sector, enjoy unprecedented job security, earn more than equivalent private sector workers and thrive on imposing burocracy on the productive private sector. It's little wonder the economy is up the creek. Unlike private sector they are not funded from investments but paid straight from general taxation.

As for the original poster - first go find out how much an index linked annuity of £6k would cost you - maybe £200k? How does that compare to your actual lifetime earnings from the Bank? In my case an annuity would cost me more than my total lifetime income. Next - why is the clawback a surprise? The bank sent full documentation of every change, just because you didn't understand it and chose to stuff it down the back of the radiator instead of finding out the implications doesn't mean they did anything wrong.
Depending on circumstances the clawback may just mean that your income remains the same, the amount clawed back being made up by the greater state pension you will be getting.

You might also consider whether the HSBC pensioners association can help clarify the situation, I believe that is independent of HSBC group (although in receipt of some support from HSBC but they do have open channels of communication with key elements of the group). http://www.hsbc-pensioners.co.uk/