Are Standard Life Funds any good or is it worth me switching?

Carpi09

dunstonh wrote: »

It would be silly to use the VLS funds on a nil value starting point and a small contribution. Indeed, using a SIPP full stop is not ideal.

£80pm is £960 a year. £2pm equates to 2.50% p.a. charge against £960 fund value. It will get less every year but it will take very many years for that to become average value, let along good value. I would suggest that the SIPP is not the product you should be using with a small contribution and certainly not the VLS funds.

Well I want to start early and contribute to a pension. This has scared me a little if I'm honest, so do I need to cancel the SIPP then? What pension should I contribute to?

dunstonh

Carpi09 wrote: »

Well I want to start early and contribute to a pension. This has scared me a little if I'm honest, so do I need to cancel the SIPP then? What pension should I contribute to?

A SIPP is for experienced investors wanting more advanced investor options. in some cases, it can allow access to low cost investments but the potential to end up with very expensive or even unregulated investments exists. SIPPs are frequently priced for larger amounts too.

A stakeholder pension or personal pension would be more suitable for someone starting with a nil value and a small regular contribution. Your monthly contribution is lower than most personal pensions require. So, a stakeholder pension may be more appropriate.

Carpi09

dunstonh wrote: »

A SIPP is for experienced investors wanting more advanced investor options. in some cases, it can allow access to low cost investments but the potential to end up with very expensive or even unregulated investments exists. SIPPs are frequently priced for larger amounts too.

A stakeholder pension or personal pension would be more suitable for someone starting with a nil value and a small regular contribution. Your monthly contribution is lower than most personal pensions require. So, a stakeholder pension may be more appropriate.

Thanks DH, I am now going to cancel my SIPP with HL and look into this stakeholder pension. Do you know any sites that would give me some deeper knowledge into pensions?

jabbahut40

Hi,

I managed to track down the Standard Life Managed Pension Fund and chart against Vanguard Life Strategy 80%. I was surprised that the SL fund (14.4% growth) was close to Vanguard in performance (14.8% growth) over the last 12 months.

Given that their is no performance information for Vangaurd for more than one year any suggestions on how best I make a decision as fund performance does not seem to be a key differentiator. Starting to think this might not be worth switching....

SL have also confirmed that the annual charge on my pension funds is 1% which does not seem too excessive.

Thoughts?

Jabba

jabbahut40

Hi,

Its been a few months since I posted the original thread and have yet to switch from Standard Life into Vanguard LS due to indecision. Has anyone out there recently switched? If so I would be interested in your circumstances and reasons for moving?

Thanks,

Jabba

bigadaj

There's no guarantee on investments and that's part of the passive argument. No fund manager guarantees performance and their performance goes through good and bad times so you can't rely on historic charts.

Also if you compound charges then they add up over time, the difference between 0.5 and 1% seems little but can add thousands to costs and leave you with consequently less, this is why people obsess over cost is because it is one element you can depend on and has a large effect over a long time.