Transfer my University of Cambridge CPS pension into my USS pension?

Universidad

fillip2k said:

Out of curiosity I've been told from a few different people that the USS scheme is one of the better defined benefit schemes out there. Not really knowing much about other schemes, what makes the USS one so good?

It isn't.

It is one of, if not the, worst DB schemes still open to new members. By almost every metric - accrual rate, inflation matching, the salary cap on the DB portion, and the number of cuts that have been made to it since 2011.

However, it is an open, private, Defined Benefit pension scheme, and there are almost none of those left. Compared to a private sector Defined Contribution scheme, where employers will often only contribute 4-8% of salary, USS still comes off pretty well.

Defined benefit schemes in the public sector are basically the only game in town for open DB schemes these days. However pretty much all of these absolutely blow USS out of the water.

Case in point, many of the newer "red brick" Universities are served by TPS (which is a public sector scheme) and their pensions are now significantly better than those of USS members.

USS used to be pretty good, so if you have older colleagues who haven't been paying much attention, they might be on track to retire quite well, and not realise how significantly things have changed for new starts, or how much of the DB portion of their pension accrual has been loaded towards the earlier part of their careers.

hyubh

fillip2k said:

Out of curiosity I've been told from a few different people that the USS scheme is one of the better defined benefit schemes out there. Not really knowing much about other schemes, what makes the USS one so good?

That will only be from the point of view of the USS remaining open to DB accrual. However, given the only open DB schemes left are mostly public sector ones that have maintained uncapped increases and no DB pensionable pay limit, then the USS does not look so good. 'Back in the day' this was not the case - the USS was originally designed by an LGPS actuary and had an essentially public sector-style benefit structure, and it remained very comparable to (say) the LGPS and Teachers until roughly the middle of the last decade. Nowadays the LGPS and TPS are both clearly superior though.

That said, the typical lecturer at a USS university (e.g. redbricks, Oxbridge, etc.) will be earning more than the typical lecturer at a TPS one (former polytechnics etc.), so arguably horses for courses. Also many non-academic staff are now punted into mediocre DC schemes, whereas back in the day it was not uncommon for universities to have support staff schemes comparable to the USS of the time. So there's potentially still some class privilege to savour. 

fillip2k

Well this is worrying then, the USS scheme is currently the only pension I have other than state...

Universidad

fillip2k said:

Well this is worrying then, the USS scheme is currently the only pension I have other than state...

As much as USS is a shadow of its former self, it still compares relatively well to many private sector schemes.

You are in a much better position than many employees working in the UK right now, just by being in USS.

There is a big difference between "a good pension" and "a good defined benefit pension".

You don't have the latter, but you're still in a better place than you were before you joined USS I think!

However, in my opinion, USS is not a good enough pension to simply pay into and assume you will be comfortable in retirement, as may once have been the case. Instead, you will probably want to stay abreast of your retirement affairs, and may want to make additional provisions for retirement over time.

If the salary supression in HE continues, you may decide the writing is on the wall: that, combined with the last major cut to USS, is why I got out. 

Do not feel like you owe your employer any loyalty. Keep asking the question "Can I do better than this?"

And if the answer is Yes, then feel free to go for it.

But don't regret your new job or your new pension until you're in a position where the opportunity cost is becoming obvious and insistent. It's all still progress until you find yourself stuck in one place.

fillip2k

Universidad said:

fillip2k said:

Well this is worrying then, the USS scheme is currently the only pension I have other than state...

As much as USS is a shadow of its former self, it still compares relatively well to many private sector schemes.

You are in a much better position than many employees working in the UK right now, just by being in USS.

There is a big difference between "a good pension" and "a good defined benefit pension".

You don't have the latter, but you're still in a better place than you were before you joined USS I think!

However, in my opinion, USS is not a good enough pension to simply pay into and assume you will be comfortable in retirement, as may once have been the case. Instead, you will probably want to stay abreast of your retirement affairs, and may want to make additional provisions for retirement over time.

If the salary supression in HE continues, you may decide the writing is on the wall: that, combined with the last major cut to USS, is why I got out. 

Do not feel like you owe your employer any loyalty. Keep asking the question "Can I do better than this?"

And if the answer is Yes, then feel free to go for it.

But don't regret your new job or your new pension until you're in a position where the opportunity cost is becoming obvious and insistent. It's all still progress until you find yourself stuck in one place.

I've only just come to the end of my first Post-doc at the moment, my area is rare disease/genome stability. My ideal progression on from here is to be in a position within the next couple of years to progress into applying for fellowships of my own and on to having my own research group. However, obviously at the moment funding for biosciences is hugely constricted. I'm hoping that us resigning up with Horizon might help alleviate some of the pressure on funding (perhaps idealistic...) 

This is a discussion for another section of the forum I guess, but I do find it sickening how much HE salaries are suppressed. The general attitude of universities seems to see academics as a resource rather than people. Especially as they are more than happy to use our research in impact studies and marketing. Anyway, yes like you said as idealistic I am about wanting to stay in research and help our understanding of human disease, I'm also aware at some point I might need to make a more towards industry... 

ussdave

I agree that the USS is not what it once was.  That said, there is some fairly good news in terms of the proposed improvements that hopefully are coming into effect from April 2024.  These changes will undo the most recent significant worsening of the scheme, which were really the final nail in the coffin for a lot of people.

It still won't compare to the likes of LGPS and other public sector schemes but it's a massive improvement from where we are right now.

fillip2k

ussdave said:

I agree that the USS is not what it once was.  That said, there is some fairly good news in terms of the proposed improvements that hopefully are coming into effect from April 2024.  These changes will undo the most recent significant worsening of the scheme, which were really the final nail in the coffin for a lot of people.

It still won't compare to the likes of LGPS and other public sector schemes but it's a massive improvement from where we are right now.

The recent email we had from my reading seemed very positive. I've hopefully got another 30 years left of my career so hopefully I can build myself up a good pension in that time! 😅

Doctor_Who

fillip2k said:

ussdave said:

I agree that the USS is not what it once was.  That said, there is some fairly good news in terms of the proposed improvements that hopefully are coming into effect from April 2024.  These changes will undo the most recent significant worsening of the scheme, which were really the final nail in the coffin for a lot of people.

It still won't compare to the likes of LGPS and other public sector schemes but it's a massive improvement from where we are right now.

The recent email we had from my reading seemed very positive. I've hopefully got another 30 years left of my career so hopefully I can build myself up a good pension in that time! 😅

USS was definitely a much better scheme pre 2016, but from then to when I left in 2020 it wasn't a 'bad' scheme, just not as good as before. Subsequent changes made it worse, but it seems like these will be mostly reversed from 2024. If I was still working (and eligible) I would definitely re-join USS, it's better than a lot of the other 'DC only' pension schemes around.