Delay in payment

denny1952

Hi hoping somebody can advise me....my husband has a pension with Abbey Life he retired on July 27th 2015 so filled in all the required forms to claim his pension, he has two and requested 25% tax free and an annuity on one, and on the smaller one requested full 100%payment, we received a letter confirming his request and stating that the money would be paid withing 2 weeks into our bank account....we checked our account on numerous occasions to discover no money had been paid in, we phoned Abbey Life and explained that no money had been paid and were told that apparently their IT system wouldn't allow them to pay 25% of one and 100% of the other, and they would sort it out , that was 3 weeks ago and still the money hasn't been paid, I phoned yesterday and was told they had a backlog because of the new pension rules , I made it clear I was not happy and today received a letter asking me to confirm that I was making a complaint, what do we do, we are relying on the money and to be honest I'm not convinced with the excuses so far, so how do we get the money...hope someone has an answer for me and hope that this makes sense

dunstonh

They have an issue and they have said they are trying to resolve it. it is taking them longer than you would like. So, you either accept that or you make a complaint. The "excuses" may not convince you but I suspect it is correct if the plans have a link. Such as one being former protected rights and the other being non-protected rights which were segmented under the same master policy number. That is not to say whether its right or wrong. Just to say that it doesnt surprise me from a closed insurer.

More importantly, why are you buying an annuity from Abbey Life? If the money is important to you and you are relying on it then not using the open market option sees a strange decision.

denny1952

Thank you for replying, we had a pressing financial problem which we wanted to solve with the lump sum, my husband requested quotes from other companies and to be honest there wasn't a lot in it, and it's all been a bit of a minefield to us, he is happy with his decision, the reason I asked for advice is because I was told two different reasons for the non payment. I trust they will pay it soon, once again thanks for your reply

xylophone

If your husband is not happy ( and that he is not is perfectly understandable), then he should make a formal complaint.

atush

Who did you get quotes from? Are there any health issues? Did you use an IFA?

I would presume you would get more if you used an adviser here. As they can generally get a higher annuity by haggling and using companies who dont sell direct.

OWAIN

I placed a formal complaint against Prudential when they didn't pay me when they should have (there were other matters I complained about as well). I received £300 compensation from them. Not bad just for writing a letter.