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Civil Servant for 23+ years yet no pension?
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That person has played the system well, but to reemploy someone with pension costs of £45k a year is just a bit crazy.
Crazy yes, but crazy for whom?
The employer would have paid something like £5,800 p/a in employer pension contributions, as they would for any employee of that salary. So it isn't crazy for them to make the appointment of a person they considered the best applicant for the job. In fact, the cost of the pension contributions would almost certainly not be something the assessors would be allowed to factor into their decision making, if they were even aware.
The pension scheme is simply applying the legislative rules, so they haven't done anything crazy either.
The Treasury won't mind, as the liability isn't counted in either their National Debt or deficit targets (although it will of course be reflected over time as payments are made, but with priorities focused on eliminating deficit by about 2018 this longer-term expenditure is of little concern).
I think this demonstrates a lot of problems in the public sector - firstly the obsession about targets which only partially reflect what you want to achieve (deficit and National Debt in this case) and can lead to some perverse incentives and decision making, along with the common circumstance of those who incur the liability not bearing the cost. The new career-average schemes will remedy a lot of the pension consequences, but there are similar things in many areas of reward and procurement unfortunately.0 -
If your argument is that pensions in the private sector have gotten so bad, that those in public sector need to be as bad, then I can`t really argue against that logic can I?
Well, you could at least give it a go.
But seriously, private sector pensions have changed so as to become affordable and sustainable, which was essential. Public sector pensions have not (yet!) changed in this way, but they must as we simply can't afford to be making unaffordable promises regards future pensions while not putting anything away to cover them. This isn't fair to future tax payers and we need to stop doing it.In my area of the Civil Service, the intrusion of the private sector has reached a bit of a crisis point. It would appear that the privateers aren't as good as some would have you believe and in a couple of cases their penchant for embezzling taxpayers money is truly shocking.
I know a few people who run businesses that take on contracts from the public sector. They tell me that in many cases those doing the contract negotiations don't have a clue, don't seem to care, and that as a result it's very lucrative.
The private sector is *very* good at making money. If you want anything back for that money, then you need to understand how real world business works.I am not a financial adviser and neither do I play one on television. I might occasionally give bad advice but at least it's free.
Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can't see them.0 -
If this happened in the private sector then it would be incompetent financial management and wouldn't be considered.
Yes, that's exactly it. Free money from the magic money tree rains down and little thought goes into spending it wisely. Future liabilities don't even have that much thought, and they go straight into the zero thought category.
Madness.
The entire public sector (including MPs!) should be pretty much immediately moved to NEST and auto-enrolment.
That would focus a few minds!I am not a financial adviser and neither do I play one on television. I might occasionally give bad advice but at least it's free.
Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can't see them.0 -
Well given the OP has found her statement when she left, proves that she does have a pension. That was kinda the cliffhanger- if she had one or not.
No she hadn't she stated in her post that she would get back when she received a reply from the email she sent HR."Look after your pennies and your pounds will look after themselves"0 -
No she hadn't she stated in her post that she would get back when she received a reply from the email she sent HR.
See post 120 -
gadgetmind wrote: »Yes, that's exactly it. Free money from the magic money tree rains down and little thought goes into spending it wisely. Future liabilities don't even have that much thought, and they go straight into the zero thought category.
Madness.
The entire public sector (including MPs!) should be pretty much immediately moved to NEST and auto-enrolment.
That would focus a few minds!
To be fair I did say this couldn't occur in the private sector but I was wrong, the big banks have effectively done this in terms of mis matching liabilities, paying out bonuses whilst losing money and failing to calculate future liabilities.0 -
the big banks have effectively done this in terms of mis matching liabilities, paying out bonuses whilst losing money and failing to calculate future liabilities.
They did calculate future liabilities, but using statistics that didn't allow for "the perfect storm".
I've actually put some work in over recent years so that I have a reasonable grasp of capital ratios, yield curves, risk weighted assets, and a whole slew of other stuff that would previously have bored me stupid. It must be said that running a bank can't be easy, but it's probably not as hard as they made it look.
Basel III and predecessors are now trying to ensure that financial institutions have enough Tier 1 Capital (basically loss adsorbing capital) that they can weather such storms in the future without needing state support. However, even those banks that did need support are now having this unwound without massive costs to the taxpayer, which is more than can be said of the support that certain sovereign nations needed (and will need).
It's because sovereign nations can get themselves into such a mess that we need to ensure that the UK keeps spending (both current and future liabilities) under tight control.I am not a financial adviser and neither do I play one on television. I might occasionally give bad advice but at least it's free.
Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can't see them.0 -
From my long career in the public sector I can hold my head up high and say that I have done a good job, helped provide a service that the private sector wouldn't touch (free internet access in libraries) and am now prepared to take a hit regarding the value of my pension because that is the way things go. I can look forward to maybe a 1% rise this year (but maybe not because yet more redundancies are in the offing so maybe my job won't be there at all for much longer).
"Focussing minds" is fine, but there's a lot of us who just signed up to do a job, have stayed put because we believe in providing a service, recognise that pension rules are changing but get more than a little p***ed off at the continual flak that comes our way.0 -
So you have a civil service pension as a result of your clinical hospital work rather than an NHS one?
Interesting.
I never said that.
Public service workers are just that. We don't discriminate between who works for the NHS and Who works for the CS. And I don't have a UK DB public sector pension myself.
I don't begrudge those who do, either. But we don't like it much when some come spouting political cr*p either.0
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