Accessing small lifestyle pension pot

johnnyren

xylophone said:

My previous employer was Diageo who I was with for 37 years     They stopped the final salary scheme about 8 yrs ago and put me on a lifestyle plan 
I retired 3 yrs ago and am withdrawing monthly from a sipp invested with fidelity 

Did this IFA arrange the transfer out of the DB pension to Fidelity?

If so, why was the Lifestyle plan not transferred out at the same time?

Is the Lifestyle pension a hybrid pension?

Around 8 years ago Diageo stopped the final salary pension and started us on a lifestyle pension ,     myself and the company had been paying into that for approx 5 years then I retired 

that pension now has a value of 50 k 
The large pension I have invested with fidelity was the one I had built up the previous 30 yrs ago , it had a value of 500k ,        In my first ever chat with my ifa I mentioned the lifestyle pension to him ,  he told me just to leave that as it is 
I mentioned it too him again recently and he told me to again to leave it 

johnnyren

DRS1 said:

johnnyren said:

DRS1 said:

The Diageo Lifestyle Scheme is a weird scheme.  I am not sure it is a traditional DC Scheme.  Yes a percentage of salary is contributed to the scheme but it is then revalued rather than being invested with you making the investment decisions   But I am also not sure it is a DB Scheme either.  If it were then transfers out may be difficult and expensive.  However this page suggests it may be possible and even normal (see the section on withdrawal from the scheme)

Your options | Planning for retirement | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thanks ,    I have already retired from the company some 3 yrs ago ,   I haven’t contributed to the pension in that time ,      I just wanted the 25 percent out of it ,  and keep the rest invested whether by taking it out or leaving it as it is 

From the page I linked it looks like they don't do flexible income drawdown from within the Diageo Scheme so you would need to transfer out to eg your SIPP.  Which is what you said in your opening post.

Their page on transferring has a brief mention of getting financial advice but says nothing about that.  The stuff about transfer values reads to me like the DB version which may explain why your IFA says leave it alone.  They may not want to give advice on such a transfer.  I suggest you ask Capita if you need advice for a transfer.  Oh and see what you can find out about WPS Advisory and see if they can help you (maybe you'll need to phrase it as you taking early retirement from deferred status rather than just you looking to transfer out.

Transferring | Deferred members | Manage my pension | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

DRS1 said:

johnnyren said:

DRS1 said:

The Diageo Lifestyle Scheme is a weird scheme.  I am not sure it is a traditional DC Scheme.  Yes a percentage of salary is contributed to the scheme but it is then revalued rather than being invested with you making the investment decisions   But I am also not sure it is a DB Scheme either.  If it were then transfers out may be difficult and expensive.  However this page suggests it may be possible and even normal (see the section on withdrawal from the scheme)

Your options | Planning for retirement | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thanks ,    I have already retired from the company some 3 yrs ago ,   I haven’t contributed to the pension in that time ,      I just wanted the 25 percent out of it ,  and keep the rest invested whether by taking it out or leaving it as it is 

From the page I linked it looks like they don't do flexible income drawdown from within the Diageo Scheme so you would need to transfer out to eg your SIPP.  Which is what you said in your opening post.

Their page on transferring has a brief mention of getting financial advice but says nothing about that.  The stuff about transfer values reads to me like the DB version which may explain why your IFA says leave it alone.  They may not want to give advice on such a transfer.  I suggest you ask Capita if you need advice for a transfer.  Oh and see what you can find out about WPS Advisory and see if they can help you (maybe you'll need to phrase it as you taking early retirement from deferred status rather than just you looking to transfer out.

Transferring | Deferred members | Manage my pension | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thank you ,    Yes my plan is now to get some dialogue going with capta to see what my options are ,    They have gave me details on how to contact them which I will do .
i really came on to ask if anyone else had heard of what the difficulty was in getting someone to do the transfer 
Thanks again 

DRS1

johnnyren said:

DRS1 said:

johnnyren said:

DRS1 said:

The Diageo Lifestyle Scheme is a weird scheme.  I am not sure it is a traditional DC Scheme.  Yes a percentage of salary is contributed to the scheme but it is then revalued rather than being invested with you making the investment decisions   But I am also not sure it is a DB Scheme either.  If it were then transfers out may be difficult and expensive.  However this page suggests it may be possible and even normal (see the section on withdrawal from the scheme)

Your options | Planning for retirement | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thanks ,    I have already retired from the company some 3 yrs ago ,   I haven’t contributed to the pension in that time ,      I just wanted the 25 percent out of it ,  and keep the rest invested whether by taking it out or leaving it as it is 

From the page I linked it looks like they don't do flexible income drawdown from within the Diageo Scheme so you would need to transfer out to eg your SIPP.  Which is what you said in your opening post.

Their page on transferring has a brief mention of getting financial advice but says nothing about that.  The stuff about transfer values reads to me like the DB version which may explain why your IFA says leave it alone.  They may not want to give advice on such a transfer.  I suggest you ask Capita if you need advice for a transfer.  Oh and see what you can find out about WPS Advisory and see if they can help you (maybe you'll need to phrase it as you taking early retirement from deferred status rather than just you looking to transfer out.

Transferring | Deferred members | Manage my pension | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

DRS1 said:

johnnyren said:

DRS1 said:

The Diageo Lifestyle Scheme is a weird scheme.  I am not sure it is a traditional DC Scheme.  Yes a percentage of salary is contributed to the scheme but it is then revalued rather than being invested with you making the investment decisions   But I am also not sure it is a DB Scheme either.  If it were then transfers out may be difficult and expensive.  However this page suggests it may be possible and even normal (see the section on withdrawal from the scheme)

Your options | Planning for retirement | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thanks ,    I have already retired from the company some 3 yrs ago ,   I haven’t contributed to the pension in that time ,      I just wanted the 25 percent out of it ,  and keep the rest invested whether by taking it out or leaving it as it is 

From the page I linked it looks like they don't do flexible income drawdown from within the Diageo Scheme so you would need to transfer out to eg your SIPP.  Which is what you said in your opening post.

Their page on transferring has a brief mention of getting financial advice but says nothing about that.  The stuff about transfer values reads to me like the DB version which may explain why your IFA says leave it alone.  They may not want to give advice on such a transfer.  I suggest you ask Capita if you need advice for a transfer.  Oh and see what you can find out about WPS Advisory and see if they can help you (maybe you'll need to phrase it as you taking early retirement from deferred status rather than just you looking to transfer out.

Transferring | Deferred members | Manage my pension | Lifestyle | Diageo Pension Scheme

Thank you ,    Yes my plan is now to get some dialogue going with capta to see what my options are ,    They have gave me details on how to contact them which I will do .
i really came on to ask if anyone else had heard of what the difficulty was in getting someone to do the transfer 
Thanks again 

All you have to do is search on here for threads where people ask why it is so difficult to transfer their DB scheme benefits to a SIPP.  The problem with the Diageo Scheme is that it is not clear that it is a nice straightforward DC Scheme or if it has DB elements which gets you into the same boat as those other posters.

I suspect you may have better luck talking to WPS Advisory as I suspect they know all there is to know about doing the transfer you may need.