LGPS / NHS pension / public sector pension swan song

jamjar92

Silvertabby said:

bigadaj said:

Nebulous2 said:

Transferring from an LGPS in England to one in Scotland took me around 2 years. The current scheme wrote to the old scheme asking for figures and they weren’t forthcoming. I was approaching the year mark and concerned about the need to transfer in the first 12 months, so I emailed them. I received a very relaxed response saying, because I had asked for the figures within the first 12 months that was good enough. That turned out to be the case. 

I can only imagine transferring in from a private scheme would be worse. 

What was the benefit of doing this rather than leaving the two presumably fairly similar schemes separate?

Higher pensionable pay in the new post, which would then raise the value of the transferred in benefits?

@Silvertabby my OH has a deferred LGPS pension (pre 2008) of years 18 years would any of this be enhanced any by getting job at the same council in the same LGPS scheme more taking it?

Silvertabby

jamjar92 said:

Silvertabby said:

bigadaj said:

Nebulous2 said:

Transferring from an LGPS in England to one in Scotland took me around 2 years. The current scheme wrote to the old scheme asking for figures and they weren’t forthcoming. I was approaching the year mark and concerned about the need to transfer in the first 12 months, so I emailed them. I received a very relaxed response saying, because I had asked for the figures within the first 12 months that was good enough. That turned out to be the case. 

I can only imagine transferring in from a private scheme would be worse. 

What was the benefit of doing this rather than leaving the two presumably fairly similar schemes separate?

Higher pensionable pay in the new post, which would then raise the value of the transferred in benefits?

@Silvertabby my OH has a deferred LGPS pension (pre 2008) of years 18 years would any of this be enhanced any by getting job at the same council in the same LGPS scheme more taking it?

No, because there is a gap of more than 5 years between leaving and rejoining (new rules).
 
Her options would be to leave the deferred benefits alone - or combine them by converting the old pension benefits to CARE.

The latter would mean forfeiting her R85 protections, under which she will be able to take her deferred benefits from age 60 without any early payment reductions.

Mistermeaner

hugheskevi said:

For the Civil Service pension scheme it should work for transfers into any of the Defined Benefit schemes, including the career average schemes. However, there are a few points to note:

• Transfers in are limited to 50% of salary (eg if salary is £20,000 p/a the maximum pension a transfer-in can buy is £10,000)
• Transfer has to be done in first 12 months of employment
• Transfer-in triggers preservation, ie, the usual rule that if you leave within 2 years of joining the scheme your pension contributions are refunded/transferred does not apply
  

None of the above should be problematic. However, in practice transfers-in can take a frustrating amount of time. Whilst in theory it is a straightforward process, the following needs to happen:

• The scheme administrator has to write to the ceding scheme to obtain a valuation of the amount being transferred (seriously antiquated in a world of online access and Defined Contribution pensions, but member-supplied information is not accepted)
• The scheme administrator then writes to you with a quote of how much the pension transfer will purchase
• You then write back to accept the quote
• The scheme administrator sends the necessary paperwork to the ceding scheme
• The ceding scheme makes the transfer
• The scheme administrator processes the transfer-in

Throughout the process neither scheme has any incentive to hurry or chase up a response, and the use of written material is a recipe for delays, lost paperwork and non-response. In practice you are likely to have to play the role of chivvying all parties to get things moving, and the process may well take months.

Sounds like it might be worth at least applying for a few jobs and seeing what happens 
Quite a few years off for me yet but ill keep this on my list of stuff to consider 

Nebulous2

bigadaj said:

Nebulous2 said:

Transferring from an LGPS in England to one in Scotland took me around 2 years. The current scheme wrote to the old scheme asking for figures and they weren’t forthcoming. I was approaching the year mark and concerned about the need to transfer in the first 12 months, so I emailed them. I received a very relaxed response saying, because I had asked for the figures within the first 12 months that was good enough. That turned out to be the case. 

I can only imagine transferring in from a private scheme would be worse. 

What was the benefit of doing this rather than leaving the two presumably fairly similar schemes separate?

I’m not sure that there was a benefit. I simply did it to tidy up arrangements, and probably should have taken advice. My employer had stopped membership of the old scheme, so I had a gap of about a year. My new salary was actually lower, but I moved jobs largely to get back into a DB scheme. 

As I transferred into the 2009 scheme I moved my benefits from 80ths with a lump sum to 60ths without one. They also gave me additional years which I assume was because of my lower salary. So although the 2009 scheme only ran for 6 years, I have over 30 years in it. I swapped about 25 years at 80ths for 30 at 60ths. 

tibbles209

I have wondered about this exact strategy (not so much for myself as I work for the NHS, but for my husband who has an entirely DC pension) but I suppose it just depends on how generous the schemes are to transfers-in. Has anyone transferred a DC pension into a public sector scheme and can tell us what value of DB pension you got for your pot?