Local Government Pension Scheme - leaving within 1-year of joining

Beanybloc

I recently joined an employer providing access to an lgps scheme and ‘reactivated’ some deferred ‘final salary’ pension membership (I.e pre April 2014) from an old lgps scheme by adding it to my new lgps pension account. I think I may now need to leave my new job to fulfill a carers role. Because I am leaving within 1 year of joining this new job I won’t have a full year of service in the new job. I want to understand the impact of working less than 1 year on the value of my ‘reactivated’ final salary element of my pension - I am worried that my even though my new job has a higher salary than my old job that the value of my final salary benefits may be reduced if I leave after only 9-months in role…

hyubh

Beanybloc said:

I recently joined an employer providing access to an lgps scheme and ‘reactivated’ some deferred ‘final salary’ pension membership (I.e pre April 2014) from an old lgps scheme by adding it to my new lgps pension account. I think I may now need to leave my new job to fulfill a carers role. Because I am leaving within 1 year of joining this new job I won’t have a full year of service in the new job. I want to understand the impact of working less than 1 year on the value of my ‘reactivated’ final salary element of my pension - I am worried that my even though my new job has a higher salary than my old job that the value of my final salary benefits may be reduced if I leave after only 9-months in role…

Was the deferred pension entirely pre-April 2014, or only partially? Or more exactly, was there a gap of more than 5 years between leaving the scheme originally, and rejoining with your current job? The reason this matters is that it will change what exactly transferring/aggregating the old deferred membership meant.

If more than five years, you would have swapped the deferred benefit for additional 'CARE' pension (not actually salary related, but does go with your actual CARE pension). If less than five years, however, you would have had the service moved over and have a value now dependent on your final pay in your current job. 'Final pay' here means your full-time equivalent annual salary. So were you to leave after only 9 months, but have worked full time during that period, your final pay will be your actual gross pay for the year x 12/9.

Beanybloc

Thanks for feedback. The deferred lgps pension that I ‘reactivated’ was associated with a period of service that ended less than 5-years ago and retained it’s link to my final salary, rather than being converted to a CARE value.I  built up some CARE pension as well as this but don’t believe this part of my pension is affected as it’s a definitive ‘pot’ of pension thats already been accrued, but possibly still subject to actuarial reduction if I need to take it before npa…