How easy is it to transfer pension

cheghead

I have 2 small DC pots total of £22k which I want to transfer into a single pension with a flexible drawdown access. Would the Hargreaves Lansdown or Aviva be a good option. Or any other suggestions?

kaneap

I moved mine to Alliance Trust earlier this year, fairly painless though a few forms and a bit of a wait, I think it worked OK for me as they charge a flat annual fee, it might work out on your pot that Hargreaves are better as they charge a percentage. Watch out for extra fees though - Alliance Trust have a dealing charge for every time I buy a share or unit trust with the fund. I'm not a pensions expert but I haven't found it too difficult to make my own investment choices - though a bit unnerving when the stock market crashes from time to time like today!

xylophone

Apparently Hargreaves are snowed under but as long as you don't require advice you should be able to go with them?

Provided that you don't want to close the SIPP for a year after opening it, and especially if you are intending to stay in cash, (for which there is no charge and a tiny amount of interest), it seems to me that HL is a fair option?

http://www.hl.co.uk/pensions/drawdown/charges-and-interest-rates


Even if you choose to buy funds, with a low value SIPP, 0.45% charge is not exorbitant and there is no charge for buying/ selling funds.

dunstonh

To be honest, if you are not capable of working out which SIPP you should use then you are probably not suited for having a SIPP in the first place.

cheghead

dunstonh wrote: »

To be honest, if you are not capable of working out which SIPP you should use then you are probably not suited for having a SIPP in the first place.

Yeah as you say I'm probably not pension savvy enough to make the most of a SIPP. Really looking for a pension with flexible drawdown with low management costs and looking to take the 25% tax free soon as (the 2 don't currently offer drawdown). I don't want to have to take rest as an annuity on such a small amount!

MrBeans

I'm a customer of Alliance Trust and Hargreaves.

I can't give you a comparison of the charges that each would make on your pot, but my own personal experience is that Hargreave's IT system is much more user friendly that AT's.

When I've had occasion to phone Hargreaves for information they have been excellent. Alliance Trust have been a pain in the a*se on occasion.

My experience may or may not be typical, but Hargreaves would get my vote.

Transferring a DC to Hargreaves is easy (fill in a form). Putting a SIPP into drawdown with Hargreaves was also easy.

kidmugsy

Yup: in our experience HL gives a much better service than ATS.

MrBeans

Oh, and I have my SIPP (now in drawdown) invested in the Legal & General All Share tracker unit trust.

No idea if this would be right for you, but it is pretty much the lowest cost tracker (total fees including platform fees <0.5%) and effectively I own shares in every company listed on the London stock exchange.

I think about half the income of London shares actually comes from abroad, so buying this boring FTSE tracker give an element of worldwide exposure/spread of risk.