AJ Bell dividence re-investing

masonic

Alexland said:

masonic said:

I'm interested to understand why transferring your SIPP to a new provider might impact the age at which you could access it.

There's a thread in the pensions forum on the age 55 access that has been running for several years and basically the quality of information about this new protection is very poor in relation to transfers and the industry seems to be waiting on government to provide further guidance. I don't know of any low cost SIPPs that would yet take on a customer while preserving the age 55 protection. When you transfer into a pension scheme you are accepting the rules of the new scheme regarding access age so you risk accepting a later access age.

Wow, that's all news to me, and I'm surprised more has not been made of it. It's a shame the pensions forum is so well hidden away. It takes conscious effort for me to hunt it down, which I only do when I have a specific need to visit it. I should probably make better use of the 'Favourites'.

Looks like I'm probably out of luck, as my Fidelity SIPP was opened after 4th November 2021. Had I known about this protected pension age stuff, I probably wouldn't have gone ahead with the transfer, although my AJ Bell SIPP (which I've had for several years) remains open with a small amount of residual income received shortly after my transfer completed. Looks like I'm out of luck with my workplace scheme too, which was the subject of a bulk transfer last year.

hoc

AJ Bell CS are quick to respond to secure messages but if it's anything other than a basic question the first line is always insufficient and you have to wait a several days for the right department. Anything other than UK or US listed and AJ Bell CS is quickly out of their dept. Support that IBKR, IG or even HL could provide instantly with the first CS often takes AJ Bell 3-4 days of waiting for "an expert". Not knocking AJ Bell, they are probably at the top in value range of the UK investment platforms, certainly had worse from the likes of ii not even bothering to reply to messages, but some of the praise in this thread seems a bit over the top.

Alexland

masonic said:

Wow, that's all news to me, and I'm surprised more has not been made of it. It's a shame the pensions forum is so well hidden away. It takes conscious effort for me to hunt it down, which I only do when I have a specific need to visit it. I should probably make better use of the 'Favourites'.

Here's the thread - it's one of a select few I have bookmarked to send me email updates on new posts. I was suprised more MSE forumites were not interested but then I guess it's only relevant to people in our age range who are thinking ahead about early retirement and access age.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6240982/increase-to-minimum-pension-age-from-55-to-57-on-6th-april-2028

masonic said:

Looks like I'm probably out of luck, as my Fidelity SIPP was opened after 4th November 2021. Had I known about this protected pension age stuff, I probably wouldn't have gone ahead with the transfer, although my AJ Bell SIPP (which I've had for several years) remains open with a small amount of residual income received shortly after my transfer completed. Looks like I'm out of luck with my workplace scheme too, which was the subject of a bulk transfer last year.

I'm unsure you would have got the age 55 protection anyway with AJ Bell as I haven't seen a public statement from them around how their scheme rules were drafted at the time and yes you were too late to Fidelity to get their protection. I guess you could press AJ Bell on if you would have got this protection with them then if positive ask Fidelity if they will honour it following the transfer? Might be a good test of AJ Bell's customer service on how long it takes them to reply and if they give a sensible response.

My workplace scheme doesn't seem to know it's bottom from it's elbow with regards access age I can't get a straight answer out of them so have given up for now and assume it is going up not that it matters much to my plans as there is already enough in Fidelity that with very modest growth the PCLS should clear my, soon to be bigger, interest only mortgage and the rest should provide income for long enough.

dealyboy

Hi @hoc ...

hoc said:

AJ Bell CS are quick to respond to secure messages but if it's anything other than a basic question the first line is always insufficient and you have to wait a several days for the right department. Anything other than UK or US listed and AJ Bell CS is quickly out of their dept. Support that IBKR, IG or even HL could provide instantly with the first CS often takes AJ Bell 3-4 days of waiting for "an expert". Not knocking AJ Bell, they are probably at the top in value range of the UK investment platforms, certainly had worse from the likes of ii not even bothering to reply to messages, but some of the praise in this thread seems a bit over the top.

I think AJB are a mixed bag, their IT is poor imo in several respects (I won't go into the details here) but as I stated I think they provide an excellent personal service.

I have found that they are open to discussing issues on the phone and are very willing to put you through to a team leader / manager with more knowledge to try to resolve things.

masonic

Alexland said:

masonic said:

Looks like I'm probably out of luck, as my Fidelity SIPP was opened after 4th November 2021. Had I known about this protected pension age stuff, I probably wouldn't have gone ahead with the transfer, although my AJ Bell SIPP (which I've had for several years) remains open with a small amount of residual income received shortly after my transfer completed. Looks like I'm out of luck with my workplace scheme too, which was the subject of a bulk transfer last year.

I'm unsure you would have got the age 55 protection anyway with AJ Bell as I haven't seen a public statement from them around how their scheme rules were drafted at the time and yes you were too late to Fidelity to get their protection. I guess you could press AJ Bell on if you would have got this protection with them then if positive ask Fidelity if they will honour it following the transfer? Might be a good test of AJ Bell's customer service on how long it takes them to reply and if they give a sensible response.

My workplace scheme doesn't seem to know it's bottom from it's elbow with regards access age I can't get a straight answer out of them so have given up for now and assume it is going up not that it matters much to my plans as there is already enough in Fidelity that with very modest growth the PCLS should clear my, soon to be bigger, interest only mortgage and the rest should provide income for long enough.

It seems it is not as straightforward as I thought. If it is correct that a transfer from a scheme with a protected NMPA to one without protection will have the transferred benefits ring-fenced and still accessible at age 55, then I need to look right back to the origin of the contributions. For me, all of my contributions have been made into a workplace scheme and then transferred out, so I'd need to look back as far as a GPP held with Axa, which became Friends Life, which became Aviva, whereupon I made a couple of partial transfers spaced several years apart first to create, and then top up, my SIPP. I would only need to find enough protected money to cover a maximum of 2 years PA when I am 55 (assuming I no longer have any earned income by that point). It would just give me an additional couple of years of the window in which I could potentially draw down a tax free income before the state pension kicks in.

Alexland

masonic said:

It seems it is not as straightforward as I thought. If it is correct that a transfer from a scheme with a protected NMPA to one without protection will have the transferred benefits ring-fenced and still accessible at age 55, then I need to look right back to the origin of the contributions. For me, all of my contributions have been made into a workplace scheme and then transferred out, so I'd need to look back as far as a GPP held with Axa, which became Friends Life, which became Aviva, whereupon I made a couple of partial transfers to create my SIPPs. I would only need to find enough protected money to cover a maximum of 2 years PA when I am 55 (assuming I no longer have any earned income by that point). It would just give me an additional couple of years of the window in which I could potentially draw down a tax free income before the state pension kicks in.

I'm guessing you have read something I haven't seen can you share the link please? Maybe we should continue on the relevant thread in the pensions board? As I understood it you don't go back as far as the origins of the contributions just the rules of the scheme on 11th Feb 2021 that held the assets with nobody joining from 4th November 2021 getting the benefit of the earlier access age.

I have not seen anything stopping someone transferring assets from their age 55 scheme to another provider just that nobody in the market seems to be confirming they will preserve the access age. For example some providers whose customers did not benefit from the protection may prefer to keep their IT systems simple and not to offer an earlier access age to those transferring in and may even want to decline the transfer unless the customer evdences they have no desire to use the earlier access they might surrender, etc.

masonic

Actually, it was two published statements from AJ Bell that led me to this understanding, so make of that what you will!

I shall pick up over in the relevant thread.