I'm going to lose my alpha civil service pension

Itsjustameeeee

hi, without going up into too much details. I need help.... badly. I have joined the CS and without getting into exact time frames to protect myself. I will say this... I joined the civil service in January 2023. I seeked alternative employment in a different role and joined a different one in February this year. So I am looking to transfer in an old workplace pension in. Why is this important? Because I want to lock in my pension and I don't know if I can.

To break this down further. When checking the internet I am finding it very confusing to navigate and have asked them for help already... Ill link some sources below:

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

"We must receive your signed declaration to proceed within 12 months of the date you joined the Civil Service.  " it sounds like to me this is unapplicable because a year has passed, and even though im in a new role now very recently, it sounds like I should have done this from the start. so real big bummer there...

This is a problem because I don't think I'll be employed for very long without going into it, and I'm worried I'm going to lose my Civil service pension, and wasted my time here without a pension in essence. Because of this source below as well:

well I can't find it because there's so many articles, but in essence it goes along like this... To preserve the benefits of your civil service pension, you need to be employed for 2 years or greater. If you leave before this point, you will lose all your employer contributions (a HUGE CHUNK of the actual pension) and receive a refund of your contributions, which is pitiful at best.

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

I'm so stressed and its keeping me up because I'm trying everything I can to protect myself and I'm going to be losing both my pension and job out of my control. I'm looking else where so I can protect my pension longer. Then once the two years have passed, I can quit the CS for good as the pension is too stressful to navigate. It's giving me really bad heart palpitations and I can't sleep well anymore. I'm trying to contact them but I'm not getting any replies and its really stressful. 

I'm on the alpha scheme.

Does anyone have advice for their civil service pension. I doubt anyone knows as much as I do and have been in my circumstance. 

BoGoF

You have said it yourself, the transfer forms must be submitted within 12 months of joining the Civil Service Pension Scheme. If you haven't done this then that's it. 

If you leave with less than 2 year service but more than 3 months you can either get a refund of contributions or transfer to another pension scheme.

Itsjustameeeee

Yeah thats the issue.  It's sure a refund of contributions, but typically the pension is worth far more if preserved. Even with a contribution of my refunds, it'll be a small amount, and if I'm lucky enough to even get my employers contribution given back, it's still 70% of the value it could have been if I was in pension age for 20 years straight.

I think I just need to GTFO a different CS job to preservice this... Very stressful...  

Emmia

Itsjustameeeee said:

hi, without going up into too much details. I need help.... badly. I have joined the CS and without getting into exact time frames to protect myself. I will say this... I joined the civil service in January 2023. I seeked alternative employment in a different role and joined a different one in February this year. So I am looking to transfer in an old workplace pension in. Why is this important? Because I want to lock in my pension and I don't know if I can.

To break this down further. When checking the internet I am finding it very confusing to navigate and have asked them for help already... Ill link some sources below:

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

"We must receive your signed declaration to proceed within 12 months of the date you joined the Civil Service.  " it sounds like to me this is unapplicable because a year has passed, and even though im in a new role now very recently, it sounds like I should have done this from the start. so real big bummer there...

This is a problem because I don't think I'll be employed for very long without going into it, and I'm worried I'm going to lose my Civil service pension, and wasted my time here without a pension in essence. Because of this source below as well:

well I can't find it because there's so many articles, but in essence it goes along like this... To preserve the benefits of your civil service pension, you need to be employed for 2 years or greater. If you leave before this point, you will lose all your employer contributions (a HUGE CHUNK of the actual pension) and receive a refund of your contributions, which is pitiful at best.

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

I'm so stressed and its keeping me up because I'm trying everything I can to protect myself and I'm going to be losing both my pension and job out of my control. I'm looking else where so I can protect my pension longer. Then once the two years have passed, I can quit the CS for good as the pension is too stressful to navigate. It's giving me really bad heart palpitations and I can't sleep well anymore. I'm trying to contact them but I'm not getting any replies and its really stressful. 

I'm on the alpha scheme.

Does anyone have advice for their civil service pension. I doubt anyone knows as much as I do and have been in my circumstance. 

This is how it works for many pensions, 2 years in the scheme to get any pension.

I left a private sector job less than 2 years after starting and just got my contributions back (it was before uni, so I wasn't overly bothered and got a nice little dollop of cash). 

There is NOTHING stressful about the CS pension, you work in the CS (for 2+ years), you sign up for and contribute to Alpha, after X amount of years you retire or otherwise leave... And then the pension is claimable when you retire (hopefully you get to retirement age).

The timelines for transfer of pension in to alpha are well communicated - I transferred a pension in (to a previous scheme) completing the forms to do so almost as soon as I joined,  I didn't wait over a year.

A short period of membership won't (even if it's for 2 years) give you a great pension in terms of £ you only get that by staying in the CS... Which it doesn't sound like you're going to.

Edit: currently you have a private sector pension which you can still pay in to, and a CS pension (Alpha) which will continue to grow as long as you remain a CS and keep paying in. 

You know that the private sector input wouldn't attract the employer top up when you transferred in to Alpha? You effectively pay both parts yourself... For me,  4 years of private sector pension equated to around 9 months of CS pension contributions.

May I recommend attending one of the 'pension power' sessions that CS pensions runs - they're online and held pretty frequently.

p00hsticks

Itsjustameeeee said:

Yeah thats the issue.  It's sure a refund of contributions, but typically the pension is worth far more if preserved. Even with a contribution of my refunds, it'll be a small amount, and if I'm lucky enough to even get my employers contribution given back, it's still 70% of the value it could have been if I was in pension age for 20 years straight.

I think I just need to GTFO a different CS job to preservice this... Very stressful...  

Don't stress. 

If you leave within two years, whatever you do don't ask for the refund of contributions, ask for the pension accumulated so far to be transferred into another pension (you can easily set up a new SIPP yourself f you don't already have one). That way you effectively get to keep the pension you've accumulated so far.

I did it about seven years ago (from alpha to a SIPP) and got a quite significant amount transferred over - far more than just what I'd put in. 

Itsjustameeeee

p00hsticks said:

Itsjustameeeee said:

Yeah thats the issue.  It's sure a refund of contributions, but typically the pension is worth far more if preserved. Even with a contribution of my refunds, it'll be a small amount, and if I'm lucky enough to even get my employers contribution given back, it's still 70% of the value it could have been if I was in pension age for 20 years straight.

I think I just need to GTFO a different CS job to preservice this... Very stressful...  

Don't stress. 

If you leave within two years, whatever you do don't ask for the refund of contributions, ask for the pension accumulated so far to be transferred into another pension (you can easily set up a new SIPP yourself f you don't already have one). That way you effectively get to keep the pension you've accumulated so far.

I did it about seven years ago (from alpha to a SIPP) and got a quite significant amount transferred over - far more than just what I'd put in. 

Interesting, as long as it includes employers contributions that's a huge chunk sorted then. though not quite as much as the original contract. 

Marcon

Itsjustameeeee said:

hi, without going up into too much details. I need help.... badly. I have joined the CS and without getting into exact time frames to protect myself. I will say this... I joined the civil service in January 2023. I seeked alternative employment in a different role and joined a different one in February this year. So I am looking to transfer in an old workplace pension in. Why is this important? Because I want to lock in my pension and I don't know if I can.

To break this down further. When checking the internet I am finding it very confusing to navigate and have asked them for help already... Ill link some sources below:

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

"We must receive your signed declaration to proceed within 12 months of the date you joined the Civil Service.  " it sounds like to me this is unapplicable because a year has passed, and even though im in a new role now very recently, it sounds like I should have done this from the start. so real big bummer there...

This is a problem because I don't think I'll be employed for very long without going into it, and I'm worried I'm going to lose my Civil service pension, and wasted my time here without a pension in essence. Because of this source below as well:

well I can't find it because there's so many articles, but in essence it goes along like this... To preserve the benefits of your civil service pension, you need to be employed for 2 years or greater. If you leave before this point, you will lose all your employer contributions (a HUGE CHUNK of the actual pension) and receive a refund of your contributions, which is pitiful at best.

CAN'T POST LINKS AS IM NOT A MEMBER LONG ENOUGH SADLY...

I'm so stressed and its keeping me up because I'm trying everything I can to protect myself and I'm going to be losing both my pension and job out of my control. I'm looking else where so I can protect my pension longer. Then once the two years have passed, I can quit the CS for good as the pension is too stressful to navigate. It's giving me really bad heart palpitations and I can't sleep well anymore. I'm trying to contact them but I'm not getting any replies and its really stressful. 

I'm on the alpha scheme.

Does anyone have advice for their civil service pension. I doubt anyone knows as much as I do and have been in my circumstance. 

Getting yourself into such a lather isn't good for you, especially when the amount involved is going to be pretty small given how short a time you have as a member of the scheme - but it's still important.

If you leave with under two years of scheme membership, you can, as someone above has pointed out, transfer all your contributions (including the employer's) to a scheme of your own choice.

Why do you think that 'isn't as good as the original contract'?