Protecting pensions

MrE1

In default of me not being able to find a company who could insure pensions in the event they fail, does anyone know a broker who would accept a bet on pensions failing?

I'm trying to think out of the box to secure my financial future either way (pensions fail or not).

ewaste

Depending on the type of pension they are already insured to varying degrees. In a Defined Contribution scheme that's usually by the nature of the funds e.g. provided by an insurance company like L&G. These funds can be fully insured. If it's a Defined Benefit scheme then it's 'insured' by the Pension Protection Fund and Pensions Covenant with the sponsoring employer. The exceptions are things like SIPPs although the SIPP platform and fund managers could go bust and you still wouldn't "fail".

If you think Pensions as in the whole system would somehow collapse then what makes you think any insurer would be around or able to pay out. You'd have far bigger issues to worry about at that point.

Alas a Pension is just a tax wrapper to hold the underlying investments. Therefore as with any investment they fluctuate in value depending on the asset type. You mitigate the volatility and risk of investment failure by diversifying globally across assets types.

Thrugelmir

You've asked a similar question before

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6327907/pension-insurance#latest

dunstonh

In default of me not being able to find a company who could insure pensions in the event they fail, does anyone know a broker who would accept a bet on pensions failing?

fail in what way?   If you use pension funds, you get 100% FSCS protection with no upper limit.  

MrE1

Thrugelmir, the question before regarded if pensions could be insured, but in default of no insurance possible I'm asking if there's a bookie who may accept a bet instead.

Andy_L

MrE1 said:

Thrugelmir, the question before regarded if pensions could be insured, but in default of no insurance possible I'm asking if there's a bookie who may accept a bet instead.

You would first have to define what you mean by "fail"

Albermarle

MrE1 said:

Thrugelmir, the question before regarded if pensions could be insured, but in default of no insurance possible I'm asking if there's a bookie who may accept a bet instead.

If you found a bookie who would lay the bet ( which I presume would be impossible  ) , how would you ensure they were still around when you went to pick up your 'winnings ' ?

grumiofoundation

Albermarle said:

MrE1 said:

Thrugelmir, the question before regarded if pensions could be insured, but in default of no insurance possible I'm asking if there's a bookie who may accept a bet instead.

If you found a bookie who would lay the bet ( which I presume would be impossible  ) , how would you ensure they were still around when you went to pick up your 'winnings ' ?

A very good question.

I would think that most people would be more confident with the LGPS continuing to pay out (assuming this is the pension in question based on previous thread) than the financial stability of a bookmakers for the next however many decades. 

Scrudgy

Albermarle said:

MrE1 said:

Thrugelmir, the question before regarded if pensions could be insured, but in default of no insurance possible I'm asking if there's a bookie who may accept a bet instead.

If you found a bookie who would lay the bet ( which I presume would be impossible  ) , how would you ensure they were still around when you went to pick up your 'winnings ' ?

I feel this way about funeral plans, who’s to say that business will still be trading in 10-20 years. Are these funeral plans indemnified somehow?

JoeCrystal

Thrugelmir said:

You've asked a similar question before

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6327907/pension-insurance#latest

I would actually argue that LGPS is the safest pension scheme in the country due to their sheer size across the country, their ability to maintain their contributions from their councils and the fact overall, they are pretty much almost 100% funded. Amazing what you can do with actually well funded DB pension schemes really.

Nebulous2

JoeCrystal said:

Thrugelmir said:

You've asked a similar question before

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6327907/pension-insurance#latest

I would actually argue that LGPS is the safest pension scheme in the country due to their sheer size across the country, their ability to maintain their contributions from their councils and the fact overall, they are pretty much almost 100% funded. Amazing what you can do with actually well funded DB pension schemes really.

Easy to do, if you can convince an employer to contribute what can be North of 20% of salary.......