scottish widows, availible funds on offer

Russe11

Current workplace pension is with scottish widows, not seen an advisor since signing up.

Don't know if there is any additional cost for using the advisors? Should I be using them for advice?, take it they have been paid commission, not sure what exactly for so far!

Initial questions...

Looking through the list of funds, there are "pension funds", so are these the only funds that I can select?

The pension funds are listed as series 1,2,3 and 4, what is the difference or reason for these series?

Currently just invested in a approach, is this just a fund in itself, as i keep that and upto to 9 more funds?

As I understand there is a limit of ten funds per policy, is that enough?

I want to increase my pension contributions, however I wonder if I would be better off with not using scottish widows for any contributions above the employer match, setting up another option such as a SIPP?

Either way with my future contributions, should I be selecting funds for long term holdings, since when I look at the buy and sell quoted it would appear to be costly to move funds?

Any advice will likely mean more questions, but the above will certainly help.

dunstonh

Don't know if there is any additional cost for using the advisors?

Nowadays yes. Although some employers cover the costs, most dont.

Should I be using them for advice?, take it they have been paid commission, not sure what exactly for so far!

Do you need advice? Have you asked them to provide advice? Commission is over. its fee basis now.

Looking through the list of funds, there are "pension funds", so are these the only funds that I can select?

Depends on the list you are looking at. The website will show funds for all their contracts. your contract may not have access to all of those. If its a fund list supplied specific to your contract then you will have access.

The pension funds are listed as series 1,2,3 and 4, what is the difference or reason for these series?

Different contracts get different terms and fund availability. So, some versions will only be available on certain contracts.

As I understand there is a limit of ten funds per policy, is that enough?

in most cases yes. Experienced investors may get to that level but inexperienced investors usually go with the basic options and need just 1.

I want to increase my pension contributions, however I wonder if I would be better off with not using scottish widows for any contributions above the employer match, setting up another option such as a SIPP?

Why do you think a SIPP would be better for you? Are you an experienced investor looking for more advanced investment options?

Either way with my future contributions, should I be selecting funds for long term holdings, since when I look at the buy and sell quoted it would appear to be costly to move funds?

It shouldnt cost you anything to switch funds. Most contracts have no switching charges nowadays.

Russe11

Thanks.

From scottish widows the website I gather its only series 2 pension funds I can invest in.

Notice that these funds have the same buy and sell prices, so must have been looking at other funds which no doubt are not availible.

I am not adverse to risk, whats worse to pick some dud funds myself or just let the fund managers do the risk decisison in a "adventurous" portfolio.

I likely just keep drip feeding the current fund, but pick some others and divide the addtional contributions, which I can follow and see how I can get on.

Think the charge is 0.65%, likely going to be more expensive in a SIPP?

Russe11

Even logging into my online administration has resulted in getting a message saying my account is being updated so can't do much!

luvchocolate

Well do not bother trying to call Scottish Widows they are the most unhelpful company to deal with.
My works advisors have to charge for advice but his "suggestions" were spot on for me.

bowlhead99

Russe11 wrote: »

Even logging into my online administration has resulted in getting a message saying my account is being updated so can't do much!

I have an employer pension with Widows too. Their online system doesn't claim to be 24/7 so if you're trying to access it well out of 'office hours' -e.g. late night midweek, or on a Sunday - you may not be able to.

If your scheme is series 2 pension, then when browsing the fund list to look at factsheets, filter it for that - so you cut out the ones you can't use. There are still a few funds which will come up in that list which are closed to new investors and can only be used by people who are already in them, and will be noted on the respective link, but the rest is fair game. If you actually try to do a 'fund switch' of all or part of your existing holding, or 'redirect future contributions' to put x% into Fund A and y% into Fund B, the drop down lists will just be the ones actually available.

Aside from the 'default' balanced funds (e.g. you might be in Adventurous: http://www.trustnet.com/Factsheets/Factsheet.aspx?fundCode=TPF44&univ=P), you'll find some which just have normal-sounding names which are Scottish Widows own internal funds (e.g. Ethical: http://www.trustnet.com/Factsheets/Factsheet.aspx?fundCode=YXF78&univ=P) and some which are prefixed with SW and an external manager name e.g. Fidelity or Henderson - these are basically SW's version of a fund run by an external manager which you could have accessed off a DIY investment platform and can easily research online. But those latter ones may attract a higher fee than Scottish Widows own internal funds for which you're paying your standard 0.65%.

If you used a DIY investment platform to do a separate SIPP you would have thousands of funds to choose from and thousands of individual shares and bonds to choose from in lots of global markets. You are unlikely to need thousands of choices when you are not an experienced investor - even moving beyond their standard 'adventurous' solution which is ~80% equity is more than most people can be bothered doing and will not necessarily give you better results,. Though you may have a preference for investing a greater proportion of your money in (e.g.) overseas instead of UK listed companies so might want to add another fund or two on the side if you think you know better than them.

I do use the different choices available rather than sticking to a 'solution', but I do have a larger SIPP with lots of holdings with a different provider, so if I want to know how I am positioned for overall retirement planning I have to aggregate the allocations from within my separate 'pots'. So if you set up a separate SIPP on the side from scratch, you're creating more work for yourself. In opening a SIPP and getting access to 5000 investment options I'm doing this because I'm an experienced investor who knows what he wants, for better or worse. When you are struggling to figure out how it all works and only have 50 or 100 choices, seems overkill to go and create something 'on the side' to go and get 4900 more.

If your employer is paying a financial advisor who can sit down with you for free to discuss, feel free to do that. However, perhaps they just have a 'pensions and benefits consultant' who has helped them set the scheme up and can explain how it all works but not give you proper financial advice on your needs. In which case it would cost you real cash to find someone independently to assess your whole situation but this will be costly.

I am not adverse to risk, whats worse to pick some dud funds myself or just let the fund managers do the risk decisison in a "adventurous" portfolio.

Given the fund managers are professionals making investment decisions as their whole career with access to an inordinate amount of data, and you are probably going to spend five minutes reading some factsheets showing a pretty graph of how a fund performed in the last five years (half an economic cycle) and what its top ten holdings happen to be... I wouldn't bet on you outperforming them. No offence intended

As a newbie you are more likely to find 'dud' options or perhaps just put too much money into one particular sector to give you a strange balance of risk and volatility

I likely just keep drip feeding the current fund, but pick some others and divide the addtional contributions, which I can follow and see how I can get on.

There is no harm in trying to understand this stuff by putting a 'toe in the water' and keeping half your money in the standard current fund and then a few percent in another 2-9 funds around the side, if you want to break the standard allocation in search of something better based on your own research, but be aware that that's what you're doing.

If your pension is in its infancy (i.e. not a lot actually invested yet) and you are at an early stage of your career when the monthly contributions aren't huge, then you are not playing with hundreds of thousannds of pounds. However, because of the power of compounding, money invested early in your career will grow much larger over the next five decades or however long you plan living. So it is still important not to mess it up too much.

If you just want to know how you would have 'got on' you could always create a 'virtual portfolio' online with play money... although that will teach you fewer lessons when implicitly you don't have to take it so seriously as your actual life savings.

Russe11

Rang SW this morning only to get through to automated messages saying they are closed, despite advertising helplines availible on sat mornings.

Russe11

I have now looked at sipp options, looks like I would be better off cost wise sticking with scottish widows due to there being no trading costs.

Certainly not looking at best perfoming or historically good funds, if anything I was looking at some terrible performers in recent years.

Suppose I need to research whether these poor performers have the possible of providing growth or if the funds have lost the abilitly to recover for other reasons.

Russe11

Still can't access online management, pointless complaining?

bowlhead99

Russe11 wrote: »

Certainly not looking at best perfoming or historically good funds, if anything I was looking at some terrible performers in recent years.

Suppose I need to research whether these poor performers have the possible of providing growth or if the funds have lost the abilitly to recover for other reasons.

As a general rule it's pretty unlikely that funds in most asset classes would not 'have the possible of providing growth'.

Also, I'm not sure what you mean by 'lost the ability to recover'. Recover what? Regain some historic asset value in a short space of time? "Catch up" to some fund that has outperformed them? If you are investing today, or even if you had invested in them five years ago, such targets are arbitrary. What is important is whether, if you put a pound in them tomorrow, there is a reasonable probability that the pound would grow at a suitable rate going forward.

Russe11 wrote: »

Still can't access online management, pointless complaining?

Yes, pointless complaining because they are not supposed to be open on Sunday evening.

Service Availability: Access is normally 24 hours Monday to Saturday, with a ½ hour outage at 10pm, and 8am to 6pm on Sundays. However Plan for Life, Retirement Account, OEICs, ISAs and some Bonds are 8am to 8pm weekdays and 8am to 1pm Saturdays. The system may be unavailable from time to time for maintenance.

Russe11

I was talking about access generally, I have been trying midday and evenings to access.

SW took my email address saying would contact when its back up and running.