ReAssure (General Portfolio)

ricb68

Just after a bit of guidance while I'm waiting for a pension wise appointment!! I started a pension with General Portfolio in the late 1980's, about the time of the big "opt out of SERPS" campaign. The rep promised £5000 a year at retirement for £40/mth, with yearly increases to the contributions so that I'm now paying £97/mth. My main question relates to this, every year I get 2 statements, 1 for a Personal Wealth Plan, the other for a Protected Rights Plan (COPPS). Both plans have current values of over £41000, the policy No. is the same for both plans and both statements show surrender values and pension projections. Having read previous posts I'm not sure if I have £41000 in my pension pot or £82000 and will they be classed as separate pensions for my pension wise appointment?...discuss!

TVAS

One is for your regular contributions the other is for the SERPS rebate. 
Do they have different policy numbers and why would we know have you not phoned them to ask. This is not guidance you need fact which they (Reassure) can confirm. 
£97 per month is a very low contribution towards pension provision. 
You say the rep promised you. Even if he did you have a unit linked plan that is based on the value of the fund and is not guaranteed. In dem olden days (1980s) the growth rates on the pension quotation was 8.5% and 13% because we had inflation well over 10% for the 1970s and 1980s.  
For a fund of £100,000 age 65 on a single life basis (on death pension would not increase to spouse £4,703, so you would be looking at £3,762 p.a.
https://www.which.co.uk/money/pensions-and-retirement/options-for-cashing-in-your-pensions/annuities/annuity-rates-aly8c2z86kds

dunstonh

The rep promised £5000 a year at retirement for £40/mth, with yearly increases to the contributions so that I'm now paying £97/mth. 

A £40pm contribution from the late 90s would be more than £97pm now if it had kept up with inflation.   So, your indexation level has been sub-optimal.  Unfortunately, whilst £40pm was a good level of contribution for the late 80s, £97pm is a dire level of contribution for 2021.  Indeed, even 20 years ago, £100 was the minimum contribution level for a number of providers.

Annuity rates in the 80s were massively higher than they are today.    Had 1980s annuity rates been applied to your current fund value, you would actually be getting more than £5000 a year.

Sadly, it appears you didn't keep your retirement planning with the pension under review. An all too frequent occurance.

Both plans have current values of over £41000, the policy No. is the same for both plans and both statements show surrender values and pension projections. Having read previous posts I'm not sure if I have £41000 in my pension pot or £82000 and will they be classed as separate pensions for my pension wise appointment?

Pensionwise wont care as they don't give personalised advice.  They give generic information.

The value on old fashioned plans is usually split between former protected rights and non-protected rights.    Some statements will show them individually and total them as well.  Others will show them separately.   The odds of both segments being £41,000 is low but theoretically possible.

ricb68

At 03/02/2021 the PWP fund value was £41505 and the PRP fund value was £42012 plus some pennies but basically you think both pots are for my pension? Incidentally I had major misgivings about the value of the pension in the mid 90's and took out another pension with a reputable company (cough cough) CIS, now Royal London. Strangely the projected fund value will be £27000 and the pension will be roughly £2160 p/a compared to a combined pot of £106000 and a pension of £4750 p/a. Would I be better off transferring everything to Royal London? P.S. I started the GP pension in the late 80's not 90's dunstonh

dunstonh

At 03/02/2021 the PWP fund value was £41505 and the PRP fund value was £42012 plus some pennies but basically you think both pots are for my pension?

That would indicate that you are looking at £82,517 as a total.

Incidentally I had major misgivings about the value of the pension in the mid 90's and took out another pension with a reputable company (cough cough) CIS, now Royal London.

CIS were a salesforce with a similar reputation to all the other salesforces.  

Strangely the projected fund value will be £27000 and the pension will be roughly £2160 p/a compared to a combined pot of £106000 and a pension of £4750 p/a

You can pretty much ignore the income figure as that will be artificially lower than reality.    The projected value is the one to look at but do be aware that the projection assumptions will be different. So, you are not comparing like for like.

Would I be better off transferring everything to Royal London?

You probably cant as CIS plans are closed for new business (and are not that good - I move them away from there more often than not as they are not a patch on modern pensions - some exceptions do apply as CIS did have a period of offering guaranteed annuity rates).

P.S. I started the GP pension in the late 80's not 90's dunstonh

It was a typo £40 was good in late 80s.  It was poor by late 90s.

TVAS

Again why don't you phone Reasure for confirmation of your TOTAL fund value. 

ricb68

Because they are "having trouble" with their system according to the woman I spoke to yesterday....probably the same trouble I have whenever I have logged into the website and it says account information unavailable!! Let's just say I'm not confident about leaving my money with them, especially when they struggle to access my account!

ricb68

To dunstonh, the CIS plan does have GAR as standard, not sure if taking a lump sum at 55 affects this though...apart from reducing the overall pot but if I can transfer the GP funds into it surely the returns should be better or is there something else out there that you would recommend? By my reckoning CIS will be paying a pension @ 7.97% of the total p/a therefore with a new total of £133400 at 65 I should get around £10631.98 instead of the £6910 projection for them separately!?

ricb68

Right time for an update, the Reassure pension does consist of both pots of money so I have roughly £83000 to transfer...Woohoo! Annoyingly the Royal London pension will not allow transfers in however I have now gained the ability to move my Reassure funds to different Reassure funds, if that makes sense. Their recent statements have included a leaflet implying that I could save money by moving my money into funds with lower management fees (and generally lower risk), up to £300pa however after perusing their various funds it became apparent that all of their low risk funds have actually lost money in the last 5 years. Also nearly all of their low risk funds have pretty much the same management charges (1-1.5%) as my current investment funds, so if I moved to the lower risk funds not only would I still pay fees but I could lose money from the pension pot too! Really annoyingly the 3 managed funds that my pension is invested in are the best performing that they have for the medium risk category they're in! Strangely this is more than likely due to the fact that one of the investments that is listed in these managed funds is Astra Zeneca!!! So in conclusion all my pensions are staying exactly where they are for now, I have been reassured (lol) about how much money I actually have saved for retirement and know it's just a case of choosing the right pension option when I finally retire, probably 75 by the time I'm allowed to!! Cheers for the advice.

LHW99

Thanks for updating the discussion.

It just underlines that its worth getting a handle on your pension funds before you really need to access them - and that consolidating / moving them is an option, but need not be the best / only one.

Steve182

Really annoyingly the 3 managed funds that my pension is invested in are the best performing that they have for the medium risk category they're in!

Surely that's good fortune, rather than annoying?

Strangely this is more than likely due to the fact that one of the investments that is listed in these managed funds is Astra Zeneca!!!

Unlikely a pension fund would hold more than a couple of % of your pot in any one share. Also while AZN have certainly outperformed the FTSE100 past few years they have certainly been no Tesla

Glad you're on top of it now!

I actually had an endowment from GP which I cashed in about 5 years ago to pay the interest only portion of my mortgage. It actually performed OK and only fell a few % short of making the original £50K forecast which it needed to achieve to pay off the mortgage.