Pension or savings

trevjl

I don't know, but guess  it's up to an individual employer. Mine, when they started it ten years ago (we were taken over) paid a max of 6.5% if you put in a minimum of 8.4%, and still do for me. Now however for new joiners they pay 3.5% maximum. You'd have to ask them if they have a sliding scale

eskbanker

JoeCrystal said:

Brynsam Do you have a link to that FCA's most recent survey in 2020? I generally used ONS survey on household pension wealth broken down by various factors but that is quite out of date already, 

https://www.fca.org.uk/data/retirement-income-market-data is the most recent version (September 2020), with https://www.fca.org.uk/data/retirement-income-market-data-2018-19 being its predecessor a year earlier, to which various other sites linked, quoting the £61,897 figure, although I can't see exactly where that number is shown in either the report or the underlying data extracts.

Rich1976

Lisalouise1974 said:

By my own admission I don't know much about pension planning so I need some advice.

I have been paying in to a work based pension for about 7 years, the fund is only worth 62k ( I was late to the pension game so I know this is pants ). I am female, 46, no dependants and a homeowner with about 120k left on my mortgage. I was made redundant after 15 years mid way through the summer due to covid. I was very lucky to find a new job but my salary dropped by 18k, my pension amount also changed whereby my new employer only pays 3.5% and I pay 5%. I have auto-enrolled in to the company pension scheme and have made two payments in to the People's Pension
Due to some previous saving and my redundancy, I now have saving of about 20k, which I am hesitant to touch as if nothing else covid has taught me that rainy day money is worth a huge amount emotionally and I am only three months in to my new job. 

I have never really had saving of more than a two months salary and have had just two longterm jobs in 23 years but even with my reduction in salary I have been saving and topping up my savings, again I have found this a comfort as unemployment caused me a huge amount of stress.

However, my old company pension Aviva has started to send me marketing info about paying privately in to my now lasped pension. I could afford £50 DD a month, but I am not sure if keeping it ticking over is the right thing or whether I should just keep saving this money in to my ISA ( which yes is completely pants interest wise ).

The other thing to mention is my mum passed away just two years in to her retirement and as I am not married or have any children there is a small part of me that is reluctant to tie money up in a pension that I might not grow old enough to see  - yes I know that that is odd, lol!!!!

Any thoughts gratefully recieved..

Firstly dont beat yourself up too much. You are in a better position than many people. Life happens and not everyone can afford to pay hundreds a month into a pension. Being made redundant is truly soul destroying after such a long time at one Company, I for one experienced the same last year.
Having a large pot of savings is comforting and if that is your comfort zone emotionally then there is nothing wrong with that.
As regards your pension I would check to see what your Aviva pension is forecasted to grow by until the age you want to retire and also based on your new employer's pension. There are pension calculators online which will then let you plug in your current fund values and current monthly contributions and will then give you an estimated value based on assumed annual percentage growth. This will show whether you are on track and then if you include the extra £50 a  month it will show the benefit of that too.
Based on those figures you  could then decide to leave your 20k intact or whether it would be better to invest some in the pension on top of your extra 50 a month.
If you are happy with the Aviva pension I would continue to put the extra 50 into that and if you do decide to invest a lump sum that can go into the same pot or your new employers. 
I think you are in a better position than you realise so look at your options and decide what is best for you.