Our pensions company says we need financial advise before we can have the full pot

Good_bad_and_ugly

Biffa,

Royal London had to issue an apology yesterday.

http://www.ftadviser.com/2015/04/20/ifa-industry/companies-and-people/royal-london-apologises-for-advised-client-warning-error-UPwL2rNtqZfhqWeAjN9p6I/article.html

I'm sorry that you felt the pious wrath of the messageboard good and the great.

jen300

We agreed to speak to the Prus local financial advisor who says we should be able to go a ahead and cash the policy. Back to head office who say no we have to have it signed. Stalemate! The FA says she'll check and get back to us. Will update when she does.

The Pru are still stating a new law that came in last week. Has anyobne any knowledge of this?

xylophone

The Pru are still stating a new law that came in last week. Has anyobne any knowledge of this?

http://pruadviser.co.uk/content/knowledge/technical-centre/pension_switches_transfers/#2

If your policy is worth over £30,000 and has some form of guaranteed benefits, advice is required.

Does the policy have safeguarded benefits?

Please see post 12- is the policy a S32 or does it have Guaranteed Annuity Rates?

bmm78

jen300 wrote: »

We agreed to speak to the Prus local financial advisor who says we should be able to go a ahead and cash the policy. Back to head office who say no we have to have it signed. Stalemate! The FA says she'll check and get back to us. Will update when she does.

The Pru are still stating a new law that came in last week. Has anyobne any knowledge of this?

The relevant new law is presumably the Pension Schemes Act 2015, which requires that advice is received before the transfer of "Safeguarded Benefits" valued at greater than £30,000.

Like jem16 and xylophone have pointed out, to make any real progress in this thread we need to know details of the type of scheme it is, and whether it refers to any "guarantees" in the paperwork.

Things like the name of the scheme and even the date and how it was set up may not seem too significant, but based on that people can often drill down into what your options are.

In a nutshell, you may or may not be legally required to take advice. It's not possible to say without specific information about the scheme.

xylophone

https://www.fca.org.uk/static/documents/consultation-papers/cp15-07.pdf

To protect consumers who might otherwise lose valuable DB benefits, the Government is introducing, through legislation,a requirement that individual scheme members take advice from an adviser authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) before a transfer is allowed to proceed. The legislation refers to transfers of ‘safeguarded benefits’, which are primarily benefits in DB schemes but may also be benefits such as guarantees or other promises in other types of scheme.


might be of interest.

dunstonh

We agreed to speak to the Prus local financial advisor who says we should be able to go a ahead and cash the policy.

The Pru have not had financial advisers since about 2001. They either tell you to use your own IFA or they refer you to unbiased and ask you if you wish them to look up your nearest one and give you their number. So, it probably wasnt a pru rep but an IFA.

Back to head office who say no we have to have it signed. Stalemate! The FA says she'll check and get back to us. Will update when she does.

Which supports that above. the IFA not being part of Pru and not knowing what Pru need. if Pru want something signed, expect it to cost as that pushes the liability onto the IFA.

The Pru are still stating a new law that came in last week. Has anyobne any knowledge of this?

Anyone with safeguarded benefits (such as guaranteed annuity rates or GMP) in excess of £30,000 needs to get it signed off by an adviser.

xylophone

This is from Fidelity - https://www.fidelity.co.uk/static/pdf/personal/pensions/sipp/fidelitysipp-transfer-factsheet.pdf

The disadvantages and other key factors
to consider…
Transferring existing pensions may not be suitable for everyone.
As with all financial decisions there are important factors you
need to consider.
■ The most important relate to existing associated or guaranteed
benefits you may be entitled to, which you could lose if you
transfer. This could impact you if you have any pensions that
allow you to:
• receive a defined benefit/final salary pension at retirement,
a pension promised by your employer and based on the
level of your pay, often at the date of leaving.......................

have a ‘with profits’ investment in your pension. This type of
arrangement will provide an annual bonus, which is guaranteed,
plus a maturity or terminal bonus which is not guaranteed and
which will reflect underlying investment performance. The
timing of any transfer should take into account when the
next annual bonus payment is due and whether eligibility
for a maturity or terminal bonus is affected by the transfer.
Some with profits funds also apply value adjustments in
times of poor or volatile market performance, so you should
check if this applies to your policy before you transfer.........."

You mentioned that your husband's is a "with profits" policy - could the Pru regard it as a "safeguarded benefit"?

You really need to get the Pru to state in writing the reasons for requiring your husband to take advice.














































You mentioned that your husband's policy was "with Profits"

jem16

jen300 wrote: »

The Pru are still stating a new law that came in last week. Has anyobne any knowledge of this?

As we've already said the new law is there to protect you against doing something that may lose valuable guarantees.

However we cannot say if this applies to you without the answers to the questions we've already asked you to find out about.

BiffaBeercan

Good_bad_and_ugly wrote: »

Biffa,

Royal London had to issue an apology yesterday.


I'm sorry that you felt the pious wrath of the messageboard good and the great.

Thanks GB&U, that was really useful.
After confronting key_wealth yesterday we got the following reply which suggests they acted in good faith and I was a bit harsh on them :o

As per below Royal London informed us that the form would need to go into them on an ‘advised’ basis hence why we have to make a charge for our part in the process – if they’re happy to deal with this directly for you at no cost then it makes sense for you to go down this route.