NHS Early Retirement and MARS

MrsFrosty71

Hi

I’m looking for some advice please and have been building up the courage to post this, as my head is currently all over the place at the moment and I’m not sure if I’m asking daft questions. 

I have spoken to Moneyhelper and tried to find an independent Financial advisor via Unbiased, but only received one email from an interested party who worked for St James’ and although a very pleasant person, I don’t really want advice on investments (yet), just a bit of help deciphering my options. 

I’ve been employed in the NHS for 35 years, with 34 years in the 1995 & 2015 pension scheme, I turn 55 next year and have really had enough of my job, I’m not clinical and work in ‘corporate’ services. My Trust is offering Mutually Agreed Resignation, which I have initially applied for and will find out in December if I have been accepted. My settlement will be @ £43k, which would give me some income, whilst I decide what I want to do, as I can’t afford not to work. I have also received an early retirement forecast for 31st March next year and if I retire, I was thinking of taking the maximum lump sum from the 1995 pension but wasn’t sure if it was worth adding some of my lump sum to my 2015 pension or to use some to fund an ERRBO or an MPAVC and whether I can actually do this if I am no longer in employment in the NHS. 

In addition to this, if I do accept the MARS, decide not to take early retirement, but decide to return to work in the NHS (different role and reduced hours), after 12 months (the MARS agreement precludes me working for the NHS for 12 months) I believe I can restart my pension once again and as my 1995 pension is the best year of the last 3 years, as long as I don’t surpass this, my pension would be based on my pay as it stands? . 

Any help/advice would be much appreciated! Thank you 

GrubbyGirl_2

Although I am an NHS pensioner there will be more qualified people on here to advise than me, but it's rarely a good idea to go for the maximum lump sum.  If you retire early you'll lose around 20% of your pension anyway and by taking your max lump sum you'll lose another 20%.  Your pension will increase by CPI each year, your lump sum wont.  I retired 5 years ago and with inflation my pension on retirement has increased by 27% in that time, pay rises I never got when working.  You're 55 so you could be drawing your pension for 25 years plus - that's a lot of money to give up for the sake of a small cash bonus now! 

nell_wen

If you're on Facebook, I really recommend the group called 'NHS & public sector pensions information'. If you're not on Facebook, the admin of the group has a website and they are NHS pension experts pengage.co.uk They will be much better placed to advise on your options than almost anyone else you find.

MrsFrosty71

Thank you both! I just found that group on Facebook last week and have been scrolling through their posts, I will post the same  questions on there with a view to arranging an appointment with them. 

Moonwolf

You might be able to sacrifice your redundancy payment to cover the “capitalisation” cost of taking your 1995 pension 5 years early.  Unfortunately there are no ready reckoners for this.

Once you have your 1995 pension you could look for an NHS role part time or to a less stressful job, as the 2015 scheme is not final salary you could still accrue more pension but you wouldn’t be affecting your 1995.

Even if the redundancy isn’t enough to cover it all the capitalisation costs, you might feel the reduced pension s is enough with some part time, 2015 pension when it comes in and state pension when that is payable as well.

MrsFrosty71

Thank you! I’ve also dropped the Pen-gage team a message after posting this on their Facebook page.