Pension Pots, keep 2 or 1?

supersinglerent

I've got two private pensions ( one from my previous employer which is with L&G and the current one is with Nest). Should I be transferring the L&G one into Nest? Thank you guys 

Prism

I have always had two. One for the current job and another that I transfer older pensions into.

TiVo_Lad

You decision should be based on things like the level of charges and the choice of investment funds. You want to minimise the erosion of your pension pot by annual charges, and maximise your choice of investment funds to get the best return. There is an element of administrative ease by having only one pot, but there might be other reasons for having more than one.

Albermarle

supersinglerent said:

I've got two private pensions ( one from my previous employer which is with L&G and the current one is with Nest). Should I be transferring the L&G one into Nest? Thank you guys 

Within each pension, your money is in investment funds. Either you chose them yourself, or if not then they will be in a default option.
How/where your money is invested within each pension is more important that who the pension provider is, or whether you have one pension or two.

You should have on line access to both so have a good look around at the investments, charges etc and feel free to come back on here with the details. Plus your age would be useful .

dunstonh

Should I be transferring the L&G one into Nest

I wouldn't but thats me.

Which one is the better one?   
how to they compare to a third alternative option?

DietIrnBru

I spent the last seven years moving between a few jobs. I can’t speak of L&G, but I’ve found Peoples Pension pretty flexible for amalgamating pensions from other jobs I’ve had and making it fairly easy to use for additional contributions for an extra pension in addition to my nhs pension. 

Kaizen917

I had my old employer pension automatically moved to L and G and ive been itching to merge it into my Vanguard SIPP for the sake of consolidating it(it seems possible anyway) but its been on an ok performing low cost equity fund there that I just dont see a crying need to replace it. Off the top of my head, we are talking >0.10% vs the Vanguard 0.15% platform fee + whatever the fund costs.

My current one with Mercer though...oh Im moving that !!!!!! asap.

El_Torro

I've never had a Nest pension but the charge for paying into it is high, 1.8%. I don't know if that includes transfers in but if it does I would certainly think twice about doing it. 

Ongoing charges are reasonable at Nest, 0.3% including platform and fund charges. Not that it matters too much, it is probably the only pension your employer is willing to pay into so it's what you've got, at least until you leave your current job.

One option could be to move your L&G pension elsewhere. Just depends if your L&G funds are suitable and the charges are reasonable. 

Having two (or more) pension pots isn't really a problem. Just make sure you don't forget about one of them. 

Albermarle

I've never had a Nest pension but the charge for paying into it is high, 1.8%. I don't know if that includes transfers in but if it does I would certainly think twice about doing it

The 1.8% charge on new contributions does not apply to transfers in.

supersinglerent

Thank you guys, this pension matter is very complicated, I'll have to revisit when I get more head space 

supersinglerent

Peeps, could you continue with the help - same topic. I've had the response from HR regarding my request to salary sacrifice scheme. This is what's come back: (increasing pension payments to reduce your tax bracket) is not possible with the NEST pension scheme. However, all is not lost. You can claim extra tax relief via a Self Assessment tax return. The employee would need to register for Self Assessment with HMRC and would have to file the tax return after the close of each tax year to gain the additional tax relief. Here is the link to HMRC website giving further details - https://www.gov.uk/guidance/pension-administrators-reclaim-tax-relief-using-relief-at-source.The downside with the self assessment is that there is additional admin needed form the employee's side to complete the assessment and there will also be a wait to get the tax refunded by completing the self assessment, this is obviously after the year has closed so it does mean that the employee does not enjoy the extra tax relief at the point the pension is calculated, instead they have to wait.


It seems like a complicated process!