We're aware that some users are experiencing technical issues which the team are working to resolve. See the Community Noticeboard for more info. Thank you for your patience.
📨 Have you signed up to the Forum's new Email Digest yet? Get a selection of trending threads sent straight to your inbox daily, weekly or monthly!

Pension Hell! Zurich not budging!

Options
I wondered if somebody could help me please?

Pension Hell! My husband began/invested in a Pension that over a decade and a half went from 9k to now 19k. We had a death in the family and had to bear funeral cost, also moving to new house at same time, so suddenly an unforeseen huge expense!


Phoned Zurich with regard to my husbands pension and to our shock they tell us that we can't cash in the money. While all along when he phoned them each year (he would put them on speaker phone so I would hear the conversation as usually I tend to look after this side of things for our family), they said we could cash in the money anytime we wanted. We were told this in 2010 (Zurich has a record of this call and also the fact that my husband said that he might move his monies to a better Pension value, to which they said that there wouldn't be a problem in doing so either). In the end, we didn't have reason to move things around primarily because we had no time and had serious illnesses in our joint families to contend with. Also in reality my husband wanted this private pension to remain with Zurich but because of our recent exceptional circumstances wanted to cash in some of my husbands Pension savings.

We have tried everything and raised a complaint within Zurich but they just won't budge. They tell us that it is because the pension has gone above the 18k threshold and that now the only way they can give us the money is 25% in cash and the balance transferred on to another annuity Pension Provider. We are also told that they are under no obligation to inform us about this change of law, as they didn't change their Terms & Conditions and that it was the Government and that they are just following regulations.


They didn't at any point write or phone my husband to give him a choice to decided whether he wants to cash in his 18K before it went up to the 19k, where his money would then be locked-in. They have also failed to inform us about any changes in the law that would affect my husbands pension. Furthermore, post our written complaint Zurich inform us that they will not give us any compensation for this and that they are not responsible to inform us about this change, as the Government changed the rules in 2006 and that it was broadly advertised by the Government! Ummh, what if we were out of the country during that period??

We are really desperate as we need the money. We worry that if my husband takes his pension early (he will have to, to get his hands on the, actually his money! He is 55 years old at the moment and working part time) that we maybe penalised for this in terms of tax, earnings and pension itself.

Zurich has given us the address for the Ombudsman and the other advice is to hire a Financial Adviser and decide the best way forward. Can they do this? Isn't it their responsibility to tell us about the changes in the law? Shouldn't they have phoned us to say the amount has increased and that it is about to go over the £18k threshold?

Please help us as we are really worried and desperate. We also needed some money for a private operation as there is a huge waiting list with NHS.

Thank you for your time in reading this post.
Kind regards
Ren

Comments

  • [Deleted User]
    [Deleted User] Posts: 35,242 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Photogenic Name Dropper
    Best to repost this on the pensions board.
  • planteria
    planteria Posts: 5,322 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    sorry to read that you are unhappy, but a pension investment is locked away, out of reach. that is the idea of them.
  • Tixy
    Tixy Posts: 31,455 Forumite
    Hi and welcome to the forum.

    You probably want to repost this on the Pension section of the forum as you have currently posted within credit cards.

    Pensions, Annuities & Retirement Planning
    A smile enriches those who receive without making poorer those who give
    or "It costs nowt to be nice"
  • pjread
    pjread Posts: 1,106 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    you may need to confirm the facts but I believe;
    1/ you can take 25% tax free from 55
    2/ the rest would need to buy an annuity or go on drawdown
    Possibly (and please triple check) it may be possible to pay in off the annuity proceeds to a pension to build a second lump/annuity sum....
  • Oops sorry. New to posting, so will try Pension Forum. Thank you for pointing this out.


    Also, Planteria, remind me to give you upbeat advice when you are down and out, won't you? Of course we know that Pensions are broadly locked-in for the future and that was the purpose of our large investment of nearly 10K a while back but sometimes life throws unexpected things at you and all we wanted from our pension provider Zurich was for us to make informed choices and therefore be told about the "changes in the law over locked-in pension and how it would affect us". We were sold this policy on the basis that we could cash it in if we wanted to in the future and there were no restrictions at that point.
  • planteria
    planteria Posts: 5,322 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Also, Planteria, remind me to give you upbeat advice when you are down and out, won't you? Of course we know that Pensions are broadly locked-in for the future and that was the purpose of our large investment of nearly 10K a while back but sometimes life throws unexpected things at you and all we wanted from our pension provider Zurich was for us to make informed choices and therefore be told about the "changes in the law over locked-in pension and how it would affect us". We were sold this policy on the basis that we could cash it in if we wanted to in the future and there were no restrictions at that point.

    sorry if my response came across as harsh..i was sincere in saying sorry about your situation. but accessing a pension pot pre-55 isn't going to happen..i don't think. perhaps there is scope to borrow against the funds in your pension?
  • planteria
    planteria Posts: 5,322 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    perhaps one of the Forum Team can move the thread to the correct place, rather than SummerDreams having to restart it?
  • jem16
    jem16 Posts: 19,584 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Oops sorry. New to posting, so will try Pension Forum. Thank you for pointing this out.

    You've already posted this 3 times on the Pensions board and been given an answer in the first of those posts.

    http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=64558032&postcount=485

    It seems that you don't like that answer?
    all we wanted from our pension provider Zurich was for us to make informed choices and therefore be told about the "changes in the law over locked-in pension and how it would affect us".

    As the first answer to your question points out that there were no changes in the law that affected you, Zurich had no need to tell you. The changes were actually to your benefit.
    We were sold this policy on the basis that we could cash it in if we wanted to in the future and there were no restrictions at that point.

    I doubt very much if Zurich ever told you that you could cash it in anytime you wanted. There were always restrictions to when you could "cash" in a pension.

    Please stop doing multiple posts on the same subject on different boards. The answer is not going to change.

    If you are in urgent need of money, then best go to the debt-free wannabee section as you were advised to do on the first reply.
This discussion has been closed.
Meet your Ambassadors

🚀 Getting Started

Hi new member!

Our Getting Started Guide will help you get the most out of the Forum

Categories

  • All Categories
  • 350.9K Banking & Borrowing
  • 253.1K Reduce Debt & Boost Income
  • 453.5K Spending & Discounts
  • 243.9K Work, Benefits & Business
  • 598.7K Mortgages, Homes & Bills
  • 176.9K Life & Family
  • 257.1K Travel & Transport
  • 1.5M Hobbies & Leisure
  • 16.1K Discuss & Feedback
  • 37.6K Read-Only Boards

Is this how you want to be seen?

We see you are using a default avatar. It takes only a few seconds to pick a picture.