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Combining pension funds- questions

kipperman
Posts: 267 Forumite


Go easy on me folks please, my knowledge of pensions a little rudimentary at the moment.
My wife (48) is in PT employment earning about 12K year. For various historical reasons she has two pension funds to which she has not contributed for over 6 years or so - one is with Friends Life and worth about £14K, the other is with Standard Life and worth about £9K
Her employers had a scheme with Aviva, to which she was contributing and this is now worth about £5k. They have now changed to Scottish Life, on the advise of some independent financial advisers.
The upshot is that she now appears to have 4 pension pots. We have the financial ability to make some reasonably significant further contributions to her pension. The questions are
1) Is combining these funds into one pot either feasible or desirable?
2) if neither of the above, how can we find out the best "pot" to contribute.
I appreciate that "seeking independent advice" is the correct course of action - but so far this has not clarified the situation.
I'd be grateful for any pointers in the right direction. Clearly I can supply further details should these be required.
Thanks.
My wife (48) is in PT employment earning about 12K year. For various historical reasons she has two pension funds to which she has not contributed for over 6 years or so - one is with Friends Life and worth about £14K, the other is with Standard Life and worth about £9K
Her employers had a scheme with Aviva, to which she was contributing and this is now worth about £5k. They have now changed to Scottish Life, on the advise of some independent financial advisers.
The upshot is that she now appears to have 4 pension pots. We have the financial ability to make some reasonably significant further contributions to her pension. The questions are
1) Is combining these funds into one pot either feasible or desirable?
2) if neither of the above, how can we find out the best "pot" to contribute.
I appreciate that "seeking independent advice" is the correct course of action - but so far this has not clarified the situation.
I'd be grateful for any pointers in the right direction. Clearly I can supply further details should these be required.
Thanks.
0
Comments
-
Combining pension pots is straightforward. But, until you retire it doesnt in general make very much difference. Whether it is desirable and which one you want to merge the others into depends on the details of each scheme. Some pensions can have valuable guarantees which would be lost if you transferred. There can be advantages in moving into your current employers scheme as some employers subsidise the administration thus reducing charges.
The process of merging is similar to merging ISAs - you go to pension provider who you want to transfer into. If they permit transfer-ins they will handle all the administration.0 -
1) Is combining these funds into one pot either feasible or desirable?
it can be when there is justification. If there is no justification then no.2) if neither of the above, how can we find out the best "pot" to contribute.
either use an IFA to do the analysis or do it yourself.
Without figures and information on the plans it would not be possible for anyone on the forums to tell you what to do. It all comes down to what you have and the basis of what it was set up like.
For example, I have this afternoon just done a pension analysis for someone with multiple plans and one of those is a Standard Life stakeholder. However, this one was set up with special terms and is actually very good value (can be beaten but only marginally). However, most of those std Life stakeholders would never be set up on those terms. So, even where people have the same pension and the same funds, their charges could be different.I am an Independent Financial Adviser (IFA). The comments I make are just my opinion and are for discussion purposes only. They are not financial advice and you should not treat them as such. If you feel an area discussed may be relevant to you, then please seek advice from an Independent Financial Adviser local to you.0
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