IFA cost for pension advice

Wantakitchen

Hi,
I've 4 old pensions with few years contribs in each and one current stakeholder. I need to see an ifa for advice on consolidating all into one plan as I heard it saves on management fees. All are non-final salary schemes. I've got paperwork for them all with scheme numbers etc so no searching for "lost" plans needed.
How much can I expect to pay an ifa by the hour and how many hours would they need? I am 30 years from retirement age. I really want the advice but if I can't afford it i'll have do gamble on my own sparse knowledge of pensions.
thanks.

dunstonh

I need to see an ifa for advice on consolidating all into one plan as I heard it saves on management fees.

Pensions have got cheaper over the years. Plus, many plans today have fund based discounts which give lower charges to larger amounts.

How much can I expect to pay an ifa by the hour and how many hours would they need?

£100-£150 seems to be the typical range. Some will offer fixed pricing. Fee is cheaper than commission. A £1000 fee (collected via the pension) can easily beat a nil commission stakeholder pension. The key thing to remember is that any fee you agree can be paid out of the pension.

jamesd

You can probably reduce the cost by merging all into one first yourself. It's not hard, just a few transfer forms to fill out.

The main challenge is checking whether any of them has terms that are good enough to keep - say low charges for the particular investments that you want to use.

xylophone

http://www.cavendishonline.co.uk/pensions/transfers-and-repensioning/
might be something here after you have checked the terms of your existing pensions.

Wantakitchen

thank you everyone for the replies

bigfreddiel

do you have a pension with your current employers - if yes speak to the pension dept - your old pensions may buy you added years or credit in your current pension - i did this when i moved jobs 12 years ago as my new scheme was a final salary one and i got a really good deal -moved 3 of 4 old pensions in, and one was refused - just as well as it was a final salary scheme.

looking forward to taking both next year - i don't know what I would have been doing had I not sorted this out 12 years ago - probably would have had to work on till i'm 65 for my state pension - as it is now it will be a nice little bonus three years after i start taking my fsp's next year

fj

Wantakitchen

Hi, thanks for the info. Current employer doesn't contribute to a pension scheme unfortunately though I read somewhere that every employer will have to offer one by October 2012 but not sure if that is for small businesses?