USS - General discussion

LL_USS

Hi everyone,

I only have a small DC pot with USS and still have quite a long way to go till retirement.

I have chosen: using All funds, Do it for me, for All current and future contributions, and Default Lifestyle Option.

I am thinking of some experiment, to see if, for e.g. I can move the funds now to something less risky, more cash base for a while when I don't have lots of trust in how the stock market will be for the time ahead.

If I go ahead experimenting this then I can choose Let me Do it, and I think we only have the option of Moving all existing and future funds to, say USS liquidity funds, and leave them there for a while till I feel more confident and buy stocks again.

Leaving aside whether the idea is quite unconventional, is it what we do if we want to do that?
Thanks

Barralad77

I’m fairly confident you can switch from ‘do it for me’ to ‘let me do it’ although not sure where they deposit the funds. Would make sense for them to put it all in Liquidity, after which you can arrange as you want (e.g., keep some in Liquidity but move the the rest to other funds). But if you anticipate leaving it invested for some time (‘a long way’) then Liquidity shouldn’t be your first choice for too long. It will depend on how many years you have in mind, but other funds would serve you better from the outset, in all likelihood. I have my funds in Liquidity, Moderate Growth and Global Equity (low, medium, and high risk) and the returns have been averaging out at around 5/8/15% (from memory…don’t quote me). You could consider a similar ‘spreading the risk’ approach if you’re risk-averse? But then depending on how far off NPA you are right now, you might already have something similar already (via the ‘do it for me’ route). Not sure it makes any sense to wait and see where you think the market is going and move funds around at a later date, as you may never know when that day will come.