LGPS 2014 Rules

dick_turpin

Anyone know about the proposals for the 2014 LGPS?
It appears that from 2014, employers consent is no longer required to leave and claim benefits from 55 years of age. Given that I have substantial service pre 2014 that will be frozen when the new rules are introduced, does that mean I can leave in 2015 when I am 55 and draw my pension, albeit the latter years will be reduced because of leaving before state pension age?

hyubh

!!!!!!_turpin wrote: »

It appears that from 2014, employers consent is no longer required to leave and claim benefits from 55 years of age.

Apparently so, however the employer's consent thing is a bit of a red herring. Assuming no historical protections apply, currently you can elect to retire at 60 and have the pension reduced accordingly (don't forget you would be missing out on 5 more calendar years of membership on top of that). The 2014 proposals have this age put back to 55, though again, the pension would be reduced accordingly - the table on the main LGPS site implies it could be a reduction of around 45%, given the LGPS normal retirement age will be increasing with the state pension age.

Now, it is already possible to retire at 55 in the LGPS. However, that's with usually with respect to being made redundant, in which case you *have* to draw the pension and the employer (as opposed to the pension fund) *has* to pay for it being drawn early. Just deciding to retire at 55 in the future won't therefore mean you'll be retiring on the same terms as those retiring at 55 now. In other words, say in 2015 there's two people aged 55 on identical salaries and with identical membership; the first takes voluntary redundancy during a restructuring programme and the second just resigns and elects to draw their pension. In such a situation, the pension of the first person will be quite a bit higher than the pension of the second.

Given that I have substantial service pre 2014 that will be frozen

'Frozen' isn't quite the right word, since the pre-2014 membership will still have benefits against your final salary on leaving, as opposed to being against your 2014 salary uprated for inflation.