Pension Bee or Advisor ?

MX5huggy

smallzoo2 said:

Albermarle said:

smallzoo2 said:

MFW2026 said:

Open a vanguard sipp and add all pensions in there 

Thanks. I had a quick look after you mentioned it. It seems there are lots of SIPP providers such as vanguard. I guess the only worry is that.I am not a real risk taker and know nothing about which companies to invest in etc so would be worried that I might blow part or all of the pension on a bad risk ?

Most peoples pensions are not invested in individual companies, but in funds containing lots of different company shares from around the world + non share investments. These of course can still go down as well as up, but will not be dramatically affected by just one company failing.
If you look at what PensionBee offer ( for example) you will see they only offer these types of funds.

Thanks.

So I guess PensionBee would be the safe bet ie low growth but also low risk whereas Vanguard SIPP and life strategy funds would be potentially higher growth but higher risk ?

No - a quick read of PB they have a range of funds ie tracker that is 80% equity and 10% each cash and bonds. Almost exactly the same as Life Strategy 80. You can get burnt with either both have completely unsuitable options. 

smallzoo2

MX5huggy said:

smallzoo2 said:

Albermarle said:

smallzoo2 said:

MFW2026 said:

Open a vanguard sipp and add all pensions in there 

Thanks. I had a quick look after you mentioned it. It seems there are lots of SIPP providers such as vanguard. I guess the only worry is that.I am not a real risk taker and know nothing about which companies to invest in etc so would be worried that I might blow part or all of the pension on a bad risk ?

Most peoples pensions are not invested in individual companies, but in funds containing lots of different company shares from around the world + non share investments. These of course can still go down as well as up, but will not be dramatically affected by just one company failing.
If you look at what PensionBee offer ( for example) you will see they only offer these types of funds.

Thanks.

So I guess PensionBee would be the safe bet ie low growth but also low risk whereas Vanguard SIPP and life strategy funds would be potentially higher growth but higher risk ?

No - a quick read of PB they have a range of funds ie tracker that is 80% equity and 10% each cash and bonds. Almost exactly the same as Life Strategy 80. You can get burnt with either both have completely unsuitable options. 

Thanks

So are you saying I shouldn't go alone and I should pay for an advisor ?

I dont want to make enormous gains. I just want a 'safe' fund where I can draw from occasionally and I am not going to lose my shirt

MX5huggy

I think reviewing your original post and your current position and level of knowledge (little?) and presuming you don’t want to get up to speed by reading a couple of books watching some YouTube and asking questions on the pension forum on here. Then yes an IFA (emphasis on the I) could be good value for you. 

If you did get up to speed then I don’t think you would choose Pension Bee. 

smallzoo2

MX5huggy said:

I think reviewing your original post and your current position and level of knowledge (little?) and presuming you don’t want to get up to speed by reading a couple of books watching some YouTube and asking questions on the pension forum on here. Then yes an IFA (emphasis on the I) could be good value for you. 

If you did get up to speed then I don’t think you would choose Pension Bee. 

Thanks

I dont understand your reluctance to use Pension Bee. Are you saying that its a high risk company and I could lose substantial money. What about Vanguard, H&L etc. ?

Yes I do have only a little knowledge but I have learnt a lot just in 3 hours on YouTube about Stock/Bonds, market volatility etc why if I am not going to be experimenting with stocks and shares is it such a bad thing to use one of the companies I mentioned 

cheers again

Malthusian

smallzoo2 said:

MX5huggy said:

I think reviewing your original post and your current position and level of knowledge (little?) and presuming you don’t want to get up to speed by reading a couple of books watching some YouTube and asking questions on the pension forum on here. Then yes an IFA (emphasis on the I) could be good value for you. 

If you did get up to speed then I don’t think you would choose Pension Bee. 

Thanks

I dont understand your reluctance to use Pension Bee. Are you saying that its a high risk company and I could lose substantial money. What about Vanguard, H&L etc. ?

Yes I do have only a little knowledge but I have learnt a lot just in 3 hours on YouTube about Stock/Bonds, market volatility etc why if I am not going to be experimenting with stocks and shares is it such a bad thing to use one of the companies I mentioned 

cheers again

You could lose substantial money with all of them.
None of them are "high risk" companies. Investments can be high risk or medium risk or in between. (There is not really any such thing as a low risk investment; low risk = cash.) PensionBee, HL and Vanguard aren't investments (for the purposes of this discussion), they hold your investments for you.
There are three ways to lose substantial money in a pension: 1) panic and cash in during a fall 2) fail to diversify 3) gearing (investing borrowed money). The point of PensionBee is that in theory it takes 2 and 3 off the table by not offering undiversified and geared investments.
You can still lose money with PensionBee the first way. Some of their diversified investments will be unsuitable for some investors because they go up and down too much, and increase the risk of 1).
Using an IFA makes 1) less likely, as a) they will recommend a portfolio that has been judged as suitable for your risk profile, and b) they can act as a "voice of reason" and dissuade you from cashing in your portfolio in a panic. Or gambling it away in a pointless attempt to try to make it go up when markets are going down. 

dunstonh

smallzoo2 said:

Albermarle said:

smallzoo2 said:

MFW2026 said:

Open a vanguard sipp and add all pensions in there 

Thanks. I had a quick look after you mentioned it. It seems there are lots of SIPP providers such as vanguard. I guess the only worry is that.I am not a real risk taker and know nothing about which companies to invest in etc so would be worried that I might blow part or all of the pension on a bad risk ?

Most peoples pensions are not invested in individual companies, but in funds containing lots of different company shares from around the world + non share investments. These of course can still go down as well as up, but will not be dramatically affected by just one company failing.
If you look at what PensionBee offer ( for example) you will see they only offer these types of funds.

Thanks.

So I guess PensionBee would be the safe bet ie low growth but also low risk whereas Vanguard SIPP and life strategy funds would be potentially higher growth but higher risk ?

No.

VLS funds are a range of funds with different equity content.  Pensionbee offers something similar but in a different way.  If you pick similar equity levels with each then you will get similar performance.  It really depends on which management decisions you prefer.

Albermarle

smallzoo2 said:

MX5huggy said:

I think reviewing your original post and your current position and level of knowledge (little?) and presuming you don’t want to get up to speed by reading a couple of books watching some YouTube and asking questions on the pension forum on here. Then yes an IFA (emphasis on the I) could be good value for you. 

If you did get up to speed then I don’t think you would choose Pension Bee. 

Thanks

I dont understand your reluctance to use Pension Bee. Are you saying that its a high risk company and I could lose substantial money. What about Vanguard, H&L etc. ?

Yes I do have only a little knowledge but I have learnt a lot just in 3 hours on YouTube about Stock/Bonds, market volatility etc why if I am not going to be experimenting with stocks and shares is it such a bad thing to use one of the companies I mentioned 

cheers again

As said PensionBee is the pension provider ( sorting out the admin, transferring your money in and out of investments)
They give you a choice of 7 funds for your money to be invested in within the pension. Some of these are higher /lower risk than others.
Risk in this context means the higher the risk the more likely the fund will go up and down more dramatically in the short and medium term, but should show good growth in the long term. The lower risk funds should not go up and down so much, but in the long term will probably not grow as much.
With these types of funds the risk of losing all, or even half of your money, is about zero.
So really risk = volatility, not risk of total loss.
If you were buying individual company shares or exotic investments, then there is a risk of total loss, but not with these funds.
The difference with Vanguard is just that they offer a wider range of funds .
HL offer even more funds but also some more risky products so probably not for you.

smallzoo2

Thanks a lot. The biggest issue I have found is getting the pension provider to answer your questions. Aviva have 4 of the pensions and getting through to them is like getting blood out of a stone. Their Aviva app doesnt even recognise 3 out of the 4 pensions and their WhatsApp service takes about 3 hours to answer a question 

Albermarle

and their WhatsApp service takes about 3 hours to answer a question 

In the world of pensions, getting any sort of answer in 3 hours is pretty good. Even if you get through to the call centre the often inexperienced employees can not answer your question anyway. Some are better than others in this respect.

Probably the issue with Aviva, is that they have a huge number of old products that have since been long superseded, plus pensions where they have taken over other companies.

Beddie

smallzoo2 said:

MX5huggy said:

I think reviewing your original post and your current position and level of knowledge (little?) and presuming you don’t want to get up to speed by reading a couple of books watching some YouTube and asking questions on the pension forum on here. Then yes an IFA (emphasis on the I) could be good value for you. 

If you did get up to speed then I don’t think you would choose Pension Bee. 

Thanks

I dont understand your reluctance to use Pension Bee. Are you saying that its a high risk company and I could lose substantial money. What about Vanguard, H&L etc. ?

Yes I do have only a little knowledge but I have learnt a lot just in 3 hours on YouTube about Stock/Bonds, market volatility etc why if I am not going to be experimenting with stocks and shares is it such a bad thing to use one of the companies I mentioned 

cheers again

I'm sure PensionBee are absolutely fine for you. Have a look at the risk profile of their funds and if one seems right to you then go for a transfer. No one has a crystal ball as to how investments will perform. You can always move again to another provider in future if your needs change, which will be easier as it's just one pension. https://www.pensionbee.com/plans

Or... go with something similar at another provider - there is no obvious "better than the rest" provider, but some like Vanguard do have lower charges. This obviously matters more with bigger pension amounts.