How can Aviva lose so much of my pension?

londonmike

In 2008 my pension pot was worth around £55K. As of yesterday, it now stands at £10K - even though a further £20K has been paid in! It must take quite a talent to turn £75k into £10K!! I am currently contributing £7,000 a year.

The FTSE stands roughly where it was 4 years ago, so why such a loss?

Is there a worse pension provider than Aviva? Obviously no point is saving for the future.

dunstonh

so why such a loss?

Clearly there hasnt been such a loss. Chances are you not comparing like for like. For example, your pot could be in two segments. One cover ex protected rights and one covering non-protected rights and you are just looking at one segment.

Why are you looking at the FTSE? If you are invested in the Aviva index tracking fund then you will get more than the FTSE. So, you already know it cant be right.

Is there a worse pension provider than Aviva? Obviously no point is saving for the future.

How about being serious? Clearly you have either mis-read something or an error has occurred. Why not find out what it is before ranting. Aviva have no funds which have dropped like that. You mention FTSE which suggests you are in their index tracking fund. It certainly hasnt dropped.

londonmike

Forgive my naivety. Like most laymen, I have nothing to go on except the annual statement from Aviva, which is accompanied by a pile of unintelligible gobbledegook.

Facts are, the value of my pension pot was £55k in 2008, £47K in 2009 and £10K as of yesterday. Like many, I bought into a company pension scheme recommended by my employer. It is totally b useless! Might as well spend my £7K a year God save us all from experts!

dunstonh

Facts are, the value of my pension pot was £55k in 2008, £47K in 2009 and £10K as of yesterday.

I dont believe they are the facts as Aviva have no funds which have fallen by anything even remotely close to that.

Like many, I bought into a company pension scheme recommended by my employer. It is totally b useless! Might as well spend my £7K a year God save us all from experts!

Is this real or are you just trolling? I would have thought anyone that has seen such a drop and told it is not possible would be interested in getting it sorted rather than making silly comments on a website. By the way, a pension fund of £10,000 does not provide a pension of £7000 a year.

xylophone

By the way, a pension fund of £10,000 does not provide a pension of £7000 a year.

The £7000 appears to be the OP's annual contribution to his pension fund?


Could the OP copy his pension statement (blocking out personal details) on to the board?

londonmike

dunstonh wrote: »

I dont believe they are the facts as Aviva have no funds which have fallen by anything even remotely close to that.



Is this real or are you just trolling? I would have thought anyone that has seen such a drop and told it is not possible would be interested in getting it sorted rather than making silly comments on a website. By the way, a pension fund of £10,000 does not provide a pension of £7000 a year.

It's all in the detail.... who said anything about a pension of £7k a year?? I didn't. The £7k figure is my current contribution level (mine plus employer). I reiterate, the only facts I have to go on are my annual statements, the most recent of which (yesterday) forecasts an annual pension of £500. The £10K pot is the combined value of the 2 segments of my fund.

Your negative arrogance leads me to suspect you must be the CEO of Aviva.

xylophone

Are you able to show your statement - I am assuming that this shows the funds in which the pension is invested. Have the funds been the same since inception?

WestonDave

Mike - its understandable that you are upset and worried, but pension pots don't simply disappear without that happening in line with the fund values that they are invested in. As an IFA Dunston would have access to this and would know that none of their funds (nor presumably his other clients) are showing falls of the magnitude needed for a loss on the scale you are seeing.

That suggests that whilst you have got "evidence" on your statements, its more likely that some kind of error has occurred rather than just an investment loss, which makes it important that you contact them and query it so it can be put right.

dunstonh

Your negative arrogance leads me to suspect you must be the CEO of Aviva.

Your unwillingness to resolve what is clearly an error or you misreading it leads me to suspect you are making the whole thing up. I'm not the one being arrogant. You are.

Aviva are prone to clerical errors possibly more than other insurers. However, I repeat again, that they have no funds in their own range that have lost that sort of money or anything close to that amount. It will either be a clerical error or pension that is in multiple segments or policies or you have not got the Aviva insured contract but their wrap contract and you have made your own investment decisions and picked something that has nothing to do with them that has lost that amount of money.

Any normal person would be on the phone to them or their adviser asking for clarification and looking to get an answer.

RichandJ

londonmike wrote: »

Forgive my naivety. Like most laymen, I have nothing to go on except the annual statement from Aviva, which is accompanied by a pile of unintelligible gobbledegook.

Facts are, the value of my pension pot was £55k in 2008, £47K in 2009 and £10K as of yesterday. Like many, I bought into a company pension scheme recommended by my employer. It is totally b useless! Might as well spend my £7K a year God save us all from experts!

So you can't actually be bothered to try to read and understand the accompanying literature. Most of which, for various legal reasons has to accompany statements provided either by insurers or by company schemes.

So you can't actually be bothered to go back to the insurer and check the figures. You'd rather rant without posting evidence.

dunstonh is an IFA, God knows as a Final Salary administrator I have no love for IFAs, but he has access to all the data on every pension provider - if he says no Aviva fund has dropped by that much I'd be inclined to believe him rather than a newbie with 4 posts.

Others have also endorsed this & asked you to provide further details - you've disappeared. Perhaps you have now read some of the "unintelligible gobbledegook" or even further into the statement and realised your initial unthinking rant may not have been correct. If that is so, perhaps you might be man or woman enough to come back and apologise to those you've insulted.

eltacano

I can sympathise with you, Mike, because I recently had the opportunity to transfer my pension pot to an insurance compnay, but was unhappy with the arrogant and evasive way they dealt with my queries.

I'm only a few years from retirement, so I didn't want to take too many risks. However, if I were to put my pot into their cash fund, I'd be lucky to get a return of 1%.

When you ask them why the return on cash is so low, when high street banks are paying 4%, you get the usual drivel that you aren't supposed to leave it in cash for extended periods. Well, I'm sorry, it's my decision if I want to keep it in cash!!

And if I'm only getting a paltry fraction of a % on my cash, who's getting the rest?

There isn't even a comparison table available anywhere giving the returns on cash funds of the various pension providers. I wonder why? (If the situation has changed since I researched this, I'd be delighted if one of our resident IFAs would put me right).

No, it's obvious that cash doesn't suit them, because it doesn't give them so many opportunities to fleece you!