Civil Servant for 23+ years yet no pension?

jac29

Annie1960 - Thank you so much for your reply. You are the sort of person I was hoping would read my thread. Just yesterday I managed to get that email address and I have sent all my details to them. I had been given an email address previously with the 'n' missing which is why i didn't get any response! It does seem clear to me now that someone at HR has made an error. As I said earlier in this thread it's not a surprise as they made many with me. I will wait now to hear what they say and find out where to take it from there. I feel confident now that i do have deferred pension entitlement and just need to know how much it will be, so I can see the shortfall and do something about it...That will be another thread!
Thanks again. Will post when i get a response to my email so that all you kind people know your efforts have been worthwhile x

uknick

Annie1960 wrote: »

I hope you get this sorted out. My recollection is that they should preserve what you had accrued at the point where you left, and when you reach 55 they will start to increase it with inflation.

I think your final salary increases at RPI (and then CPI with the changes brought in a couple of years ago) from date of leaving the civil service until you start to take the pension.

The 55 age thing is to do with talking your pension early. For instance I took mine at 50 and won't get an annual increases until I reach 55.

Annie1960

jac29 wrote: »

Annie1960 - Thank you so much for your reply. You are the sort of person I was hoping would read my thread. Just yesterday I managed to get that email address and I have sent all my details to them. I had been given an email address previously with the 'n' missing which is why i didn't get any response! It does seem clear to me now that someone at HR has made an error. As I said earlier in this thread it's not a surprise as they made many with me. I will wait now to hear what they say and find out where to take it from there. I feel confident now that i do have deferred pension entitlement and just need to know how much it will be, so I can see the shortfall and do something about it...That will be another thread!
Thanks again. Will post when i get a response to my email so that all you kind people know your efforts have been worthwhile x

If you are in classic, you should be able to work out your entitlement.

1. Take your final annual salary for your last 12 months of service (including any temporary promotion payments). For example, let's keep it simple and assume £20,000.

2. Divide by 80. equals £250.

3. Multiply by the number of full-time equivalent years of service (you will need to take into account any part-time work here). Let's assume you did 10 years full time, and 10 years working two and a half days a week. This equates to 15 full years in total.


4. Multiply para 2 above by para 3 e.g. £250 by 15 = £3750 per year pension (inflation linked, I think to CPI). You will also get a lump sum of three times your annual pension, i.e. £3750 multiplied by 3 = £11,250.

You can elect to take a bigger lump sum by commuting your annual pension, i.e. swap some of your annual pension for a bigger lump sum.

You can also the the opposite, known as an inverse commutation, which involves swapping some or all of your lump sum for extra pension. The rates for this depend on your age and the time you take your pension, and what the rates are. I did and inverse commutation as I did not want the lump sum, and preferred the extra income.

The above only applies if you remained in the 'classic' scheme. I did not move to any of the other options so don't know the formula for them.

However, your main goal at the moment should be to make sure HR has done all the correct paperwork to give your details to MYCSP.

Good luck with this.

The final factor is to consider whether you made any extra contributions from your salary, e.g. the AVC with either Equitable Life or Scottish Widows, or the stakeholder with Standard Life. If you have any of these you will know as they write to you at home every year with details of your contribution and how much your fund is worth.

Anne

gadgetmind

Well done, but it's crazy stuff like this that's sounded the death knell for final salary pensions. No way can companies afford to make promises like this without risking going out of business and needing the tax payer to make good on their insane pension promises.

greenglide

Surely the pension accrued will be index linked to CPI up to retirement or is this relatively recent?

My accrued LGPS entitlement since 1996 was and my current employers DB scheme would be as well.

Linking to CPI can at times be very generous!

hyubh

As greenglide says, that isn't actually true given index linking of deferred benefits - this isn't to deny you have benefited, just not quite as stupendously as the raw figures may suggest.

How many years is 'years ago' out of interest? Using the latest PI tables (*), £31,000 in today's money was £22,750 ten years ago and £18,000 twenty years ago. As such, if someone had (say) a deferred LGPS pension from twenty years ago based on a leaving salary of £20,000, came back and combined their pension benefits before retiring age 65 on a final salary of £31,000, then they would have actually lost out and should have kept their benefits separate.

(*) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/public-service-pensions-increase-2014

hyubh

With the RPI/CPI increases it would have given me a 'salary' level for pension purposes of approx. £8000.

Are you saying the 8K figure is the index linked one, and that this figure was for full time equivalent salary? Because £8K dating from the mid-70s uprated for PI would be approaching £80K; conversely, 8K in today's terms would be under a grand back then.

By going back, the pension would then be based on the new salary. It was quite a common thing to go back for a couple of years to enhance your 'pensionable salary' figure.

For sure, and in a funded final salary scheme at least the risk of late career (or more exactly, late membership) pay rises is one of the factors the fund actuary will use to determine employer contributions. In the LGPS, for example, a private sector contractor participating due to 'Fair Deal' legislation can be likely to face employer rate rises purely given their contributing employees have a lot of membership and are nearing the end of their careers.

hyubh

To maximise my retirement income, I used those years with the Civil Service to my advantage by going back on a mid range salary for the final two years of work until I was 60 which directly increased my pension by nearly 4 times.

Fair enough, though if you had been a career civil servant, presumably your pay might have risen something like 3 times in the same period, assuming career progression? You're making yourself sound devious, when by the sounds of it the pension scheme just did the job it was supposed to - namely, attract an experienced and presumably capable worker back from the private sector, albeit only at the end of his career.

bigadaj

hyubh wrote: »

Fair enough, though if you had been a career civil servant, presumably your pay might have risen something like 3 times in the same period, assuming career progression? You're making yourself sound devious, when by the sounds of it the pension scheme just did the job it was supposed to - namely, attract an experienced and presumably capable worker back from the private sector, albeit only at the end of his career.

It might have attracted an experienced and capable worker back from the private sector but what a cost to pay for that.

Fair play if that's the way the system works but it's still crazy, for going back to the public sector for a couple of years this person has benefitted, or cost the state really, £3500 per year. Retiring at 60 average life expectancy would be what, around 25 years, so that's nearly £90000 in today's money for that extra two years service.

I'm not having a Go at that individual, most people will work the system as best they can, and I'd include myself in that generally, it's just such a helluva additional cost, no wonder the country is so indebted.

Tromking

bigadaj wrote: »

I'm not having a Go at that individual, most people will work the system as best they can, and I'd include myself in that generally, it's just such a helluva additional cost, no wonder the country is so indebted.

Genuine worry re. the country`s finances or annoyance that they themselves did `nt opt for a career with a public sector pension?
Hmmmm.