About employee pension unlocking?

love2learn

My girlfriend has been contributing to an employee pension with HSBC for 4 years now, and they have said it's worth around £8000. Were trying to clear of some debt as quick as possible, and thought that we could release this pension. She called the pesion department and they said they would need to send her a benefits summary out to make sure that she was doing the right thing before releasing it, they informed her that it would take 8 - 10 weeks before she would get this, which I thought was rediculous. So I got her to call again... this time she got someone else and theysaid she had been given the wrong information. They said she can't release it at all untill retirement. She's 29, does anyone know if this is true?

EdInvestor

It's true. Pension money can't be accessed until age 50 (55 from 2010)- and then you can only get 25% out max, the rest must be paid as income.

Amazing how many people don't seem to get told this when they sign up :rolleyes:

With an occupational pension scheme it is usually possible to take out contributions minus tax if you leave the company before 2 years are up, but you lose the employer contributions, so it's usually better to leave the money in.

dunstonh

Amazing how many people don't seem to get told this when they sign up :rolleyes:

The clue is in the name "Pension".