Moving Pensions across?

BookmobileBadGirl

Evening all,

I started a new job this month and am of course enrolled in a new pension. This will now be my fourth pension scheme in 8 years. I work in HE so have a SAUL pension that I paid into for about 18 months, and a USS pension that I paid into for four years. My new HE employer is with the LGPS and I have the option to move my previous pensions in.

I intend to be in my job for a good few years but there is a high probability that after that I will move to another HE institute that has the USS scheme, so would it make more sense to do nothing now and transfer this new one when I do that?

hyubh

BookmobileBadGirl wrote: »

My new HE employer is with the LGPS and I have the option to move my previous pensions in.

I intend to be in my job for a good few years but there is a high probability that after that I will move to another HE institute that has the USS scheme, so would it make more sense to do nothing now and transfer this new one when I do that?

Both the USS and SAUL have now left the Public Sector Transfer Club, so any prospective transfer to them would not be a 'Club' one under special terms, which the situation until recently. Moreover, the USS now only accepts transfers into its DC section. So, doing nothing now and transferring your new LGPS pension into a future USS one doesn't especially make much sense, unless you had some particular reason for wanting to exchange a DB pension backed by your fellow council taxpayers for 'money purchase' benefits, via a CETV that likely won't be particularly generous (LGPS transfer values aren't currently done on market rates).

That said, transferring your old pensions into the LGPS, notwithstanding the fact they won't be Club transfers either, might be a good idea. In a nutshell, inward transfers to the LGPS are generous for the same reason outward ones are not - benefits in the scheme are basically under-valued). So, I'd suggest getting transfer in quotations even if you don't currently have any intention to transfer your old pensions in the slightest. While such a transfer would buy a CARE scheme credit with a higher normal pension age than the one in the old scheme (normal pension age = point at which you can draw the pension without an actuarial reduction), the chances are CARE pension credit would more than make up for the fact.