Serps compensation companies

hyubh

Well there you go, hybuh - you've laid out a typical scenario* that would more likely than not end up with an involuntary wind up and a default option of a transfered out pension into some buy out policy with vultures like Aviva or similar :rotfl: Surely it is a short hop from a scenario like that to a compensation claim, although not specifically a SERPS compensation claim

*For clarity, the above-mentioned scenario is NOT a scenario where someone like the OP would have actively transferred out.

Your 'above-mentioned scenario' is completely fictitious. If it isn't, name me a real case that was vaguely similar.

magpiecottage

addedvaluebob wrote: »

Most of the companies offering to investigate old pension plans are financial advisers or rogue pension transfer companies that are just interested in earning a commission from transferring the funds that you have elsewhere and just use the serps bit to get you into the system

addedvaluebob and I frequently disagree.

However, he is correct about this. The reality is that the old FSA looked into it some years ago and decided that there is no case to answer.

dunstonh has raised a concern about how you ended up transferring to Aviva, though.

That sounds like a missale to me.

gadgetmind

agarnett wrote: »

State Earnings Related Pension scheme policy issued by an insurance company (like NU or CU =Aviva now?). Comes with a "policy" document?

You're twisting yourself into knots. SERPs doesn't have a policy and is nothing to do with insurance companies.

You could contract out of SERPs into either a DB pension or a DC private pension. In the latter case, you were putting your money into a Protected Rights pension pot.

tell the less adept of us which way really is up today on the concept of SERPS compensation?

I'm not sure what you mean by "SERPs compensation". Anyone who contracted out of SERPs will have less S2P etc. but will have more (usually much more) income from the DB or DC pot that they chose to steer the funds in to.

jamesd

agarnett wrote: »

you could do us all a favour and come back and tell the less adept of us which way really is up today on the concept of SERPS compensation? Where do we apply, for example?

If you were over 55 when you contracted out, having been advised to do so by a proper financial adviser, you make a complaint to them. If you simply decided yourself, you pat yourself on the back for having made a good decision.

In practice you forget all about it because the state pension changes that are coming in 2016 mean that just about everyone who contracted out at anything close to a reasonable age would be expected to be better off, getting both the contracted out benefits and state pension benefits for the same working years. Contracting out into personal pensions has turned out to be an even better deal than it initially appeared.

gadgetmind

jamesd wrote: »

Contracting out into personal pensions has turned out to be an even better deal than it initially appeared.

Well, quite, but there were always warnings that no-one knew what the future held.

I contracted out fairly early on, and then back in a decade or so later when I was just over 40, as I've always planned for early retirement, and the suggestion was that the PR pot wouldn't have time to grow, so better to build up some S2P instead.

In early 2011, when I started to combine our PR pots into PPs, I had about £50k in there, but have still managed to get enough S2P to hit the full single tier figure, more or less.

Given, the healthy growth since then, and assuming 3% drawdown, this is another nearly £60 pw and all accessible from age 55 with 25% tax free.

I've done pretty well, but even if I'd done badly, I listened to the available advice, but then made my own decision and signed on the dotted line, so what right would I have to start bleating for compensation?

Zero.

agarnett

gadgetmind wrote: »

You're twisting yourself into knots. SERPs doesn't have a policy and is nothing to do with insurance companies.

Now you are betraying a little bit of ignorance, gadgetmind. You don't know it all. You are of course much more likely to know what you had the spare time to be interested in, right?

You were perhaps never sold a SERPs policy. We know that doesn't worry you, but it has from time to time over the decades worried those of us that did get sold one! (You know ... those typical "What's it doing now?" kind of questions )

Anyway, our first hand experience with this type of contracting out versus the type you know about enables us to contrast and compare the sort of insurance company issued policy I am talking about with the sort of contracted out arrangements you have mentioned. My SERPs policy was sold by AXA Equity and Law to maybe 50 of us alongside a Group Personal Pension plan, but was not part of it. Capiche? We kind of thought they came hand-in-hand because that's how most pensions get sold in the workplace - you get steered in a particular direction and the sheep best follow. Now we all know that you are no longer a sheep gadgetmind, but the flocks do still need advice from time to time too.

So my SERPs policy still exists, and unlike the GPP which also still exists, it performed fairly well because it has been more under my control than the GPP

jamesd knows about that, and now so do you!:

gadgetmind wrote:

jamesd wrote:

Contracting out into personal pensions has turned out to be an even better deal than it initially appeared.

Well, quite, but there were always warnings that no-one knew what the future held.

So I might very well wonder whether the contracted out part of my DB scheme and other DC arrangements have performed as well. I grant you they may have done, but then they equally well may not have done. Call it a question of whether I am due SERPs compensation on those parts, if you like

There are many troughs appearing at which we can now line up for a bellyful of Quantitatively Eased opportunities with the tickets we got when we were steered into questionable financial products. You have adeptly lined up at various of the more exclusive ones which perhaps makes you wake each morn feeling more like a master of your universe than a shepherd, but the flocks are still entitled to line up at their dull troughs with the more boring names

I'm not sure what you mean by "SERPs compensation". Anyone who contracted out of SERPs will have less S2P etc. but will have more (usually much more) income from the DB or DC pot that they chose to steer the funds in to.

Methinks you sometimes generaliseth far too much from up there on that pedestal you preach from! One man's SERPs compensation is another man's cold porridge I suppose!