Aviva workplace pension funds

Albermarle

allondon said:

MeteredOut said:

OP, what retirement age do you have set on your pensions? It sounds like your pensions are set up within a lifestyling portfolio, which moves your investments into more defensive funds/bonds as you approach that age. Your product documentation will have told you that.

It probably was set to 55 which is well in the past.

They normally default to 65 and only change if you change them. 

allondon

@dunstonh  Thank you for the detailed and professional explanation. I guess my best bet will be to transfer out from Aviva to AJBell or another provider that accepts drawdown funds and offers online self-management. Otherwise I will remain stuck with what I'm invested into as every response (just response, not action) from Aviva takes at least a week (not counting my time on the phone with them) and these 2 funds are managed by separate teams. I did not expect the pension funds to be so liberally regulated.

dunstonh

allondon said:

@dunstonh  Thank you for the detailed and professional explanation. I guess my best bet will be to transfer out from Aviva to AJBell or another provider that accepts drawdown funds and offers online self-management. Otherwise I will remain stuck with what I'm invested into as every response (just response, not action) from Aviva takes at least a week (not counting my time on the phone with them) and these 2 funds are managed by separate teams. I did not expect the pension funds to be so liberally regulated.

When you want to DIY, then you are better off switching to a provider that caters for the DIY market and not one that is geared to intermediaries.  That is, unless there are some contractual reasons that make the existing plans worth keeping (e.g. valuable guarantees no longer available on modern plans).   So, you are probably right to move them.