Where do I begin to open a pension?

IloveElephants

   Hi Everyone, 
I want to thank everyone on here that informed me that I should be in an automatic pension which I didn't know about.
My question is straight forward, im 36 years old, I do not own a home at the moment but hope to do so soon, I have no pension and my employer did not enrol me into an automatic pension. 

Where do I start? Is it too late? even If I deposit £200 per month in I will do my best to hopefully grow my pension. 
I have savings of £20k that I have saved for a house deposit, 

Please advise me
Thank You 
 

IloveElephants

I only work for a small company 2 full time employers 

JoeCrystal

Your employer must auto-enrol you if you meet the criteria as follows:

• At least 22 years old;
• Not yet at State Pension age;
• Earning a salary of at least £10,000 per annum 
• Normally working in the UK under a contract of employment

If you do meet the criteria above, then they are breaking the law. The Pensions Regulator may impose fines ranging from a £400 fixed penalty to a varying daily escalating penalty from £50 to £10,000. So ask your employer why they are not auto-enrolling you into the pension scheme.

cloud_dog

As Joe says, the workplace pension needs sorting out so that you can make use of the employer's contributions (as well as yours and tax relief).

Re the £20k saved for a house purchase, is this in a HTB ISA or a Lifetime ISA?  If it is not you need to open a LISA as soon as you can and start transferring the monies (£4k each year) in to the LISA.  The Government will then top it up by 25%, so each £4k deposited becomes £5k.

IloveElephants

JoeCrystal said:

Your employer must auto-enrol you if you meet the criteria as follows:

• At least 22 years old;
• Not yet at State Pension age;
• Earning a salary of at least £10,000 per annum 
• Normally working in the UK under a contract of employment

If you do meet the criteria above, then they are breaking the law. The Pensions Regulator may impose fines ranging from a £400 fixed penalty to a varying daily escalating penalty from £50 to £10,000. So ask your employer why they are not auto-enrolling you into the pension scheme.

Thanks Joe
Yes I meet all of the criteria 
I will find out about auto enroll pension
I really appreciate your advise 

IloveElephants

cloud_dog said:

As Joe says, the workplace pension needs sorting out so that you can make use of the employer's contributions (as well as yours and tax relief).

Re the £20k saved for a house purchase, is this in a HTB ISA or a Lifetime ISA?  If it is not you need to open a LISA as soon as you can and start transferring the monies (£4k each year) in to the LISA.  The Government will then top it up by 25%, so each £4k deposited becomes £5k.

Thanks Cloud

Yes 2 weeks ago I openes a LISA with moneybox and deposited 4k in so my balance is now £4k.   

kuratowski

IloveElephants said:

Where do I start? Is it too late? even If I deposit £200 per month in I will do my best to hopefully grow my pension. 

It's not too late, and in my view your plan is a good one.  The important thing is to start saving as soon as you can, and to keep on saving as much as you can.  It takes decades to save for a pension, but the goal is that this will provide you an income for decades in retirement.

IloveElephants

kuratowski said:

IloveElephants said:

Where do I start? Is it too late? even If I deposit £200 per month in I will do my best to hopefully grow my pension. 

It's not too late, and in my view your plan is a good one.  The important thing is to start saving as soon as you can, and to keep on saving as much as you can.  It takes decades to save for a pension, but the goal is that this will provide you an income for decades in retirement.

Thanks Kuratowski
I agree
Yes you have to begin right now,