It's no brainer to consolidate my pensions into Fidelity or other cheaper SIPP?

IamWood

Hi fellow members,

I’ve more or less made up my mind to retire once both of my sons have finished university. My pension + ISA is about 1.7m.

I have several pension accounts from previous employments.

My current workplace pension with Fidelity is very flexible, and the only charges at the moment are the fund management fees (around 0.17%).

It seems like a bit of a no-brainer to transfer at least some of my old workplace pensions into Fidelity.

Does anyone have any other thoughts or suggestions?

Thanks!

Provider	Amount(£1K)	Charge	Active
Ageon Work Pension	370	0.27%	No
Aegon & Scottish Equitable	370	0.45%`	No
L&G Work Pension	160	0.35%	No
Vanguard	300	0.32%	No
Fidelity	70	0.17% (only fund charge applicable)	Yes

El_Torro

For a pension that large you’ll save even more by going with a provider that charges a flat fee rather than a percentage.

I personally wouldn’t be comfortable having all the money in one pension provider. I’d have at least 2, mainly in case one experiences IT issues and you can’t access your pension for a period of time.

gm0

Fidelity is a reputable provider. And using the ETF option. Low capped fee. As I do. Mostly.

Makes it a fixed fee cap for the platform. Whereas with funds there is a % platform charge.
So % but a lower one for larger pots - for funds.
Also cashback needs factoring in. They do that most years recently.

I use mostly ETFs and some funds to achieve my goals. Fidelity are not entirely stupid. Some ETF versions are not offered in some categories. e.g. Money Market funds. There are a couple of decent appropriate MMFs but only as funds. The popular CSH2 ETF isn't offered. So you can't take any MMF holding out of "fund world". Wheras for global equities - there is a choice of ETFs. VEVE etc. It will be interesting to see if they add the new Vanguard ETFs later this year.

Regular traders can find cheaper places. Buy and hold will not care

Absence of DIY individual gilts for holding to term for ladders vs funds is the main gap I can see. Something I may want. And which I have learned may not be available without a platform switch for one section of my pension.

Older pensions at fair prices can be worth keeping. As "2nd provider" if untouched or if they provide a desired good enough access method. Many older occupational schemes - trust based etc. Use insured funds and have the 100% protection associated with that. And some now offer master trusts and drawdown. Mine did that. So I use it. Insured funds, albeit limited range. And 0.06% platform fee. Funds are market price. So the "premium" paid to keep 2nd provider and insured funds status is low. Downside is complexity for executors - so I may sensibly need to tidy up later.

Consolidation into one - creates an IT problems/provider failure access risk - all eggs one basket. You carry it and have simpler affairs and rebalancing. Or you use a couple. And have to deal with the fact that you have two. And so will you executor

But all this is very much second order issues - compared with appropriate "portfolio" to deliver your retirement income goals.

dunstonh

The Fidelity workplace pension is a bundled contract where the fund charges are higher than the unbundled version as they include a margin to go to Fidelity. So, lower cost alternatives may exist (especially on your invested value). Not by a lot in percentage terms but enough. Plus Fidelity's workplace pension is quite limited and not greated for self directed transactions.

Albermarle

You would have to check with Fidelity workplace pension first about transferring in.

Most posters on here would be more familiar with 'Fidelity Personal Investing', which is the Fidelity platform for the general public and is not the same.

Labtebricolist

I have a Fidelity SIPP which has all my consolidated pensions - if you hold only ETFs in it the fees are very low. I also have recently entered a Fidelity workplace pension which has a very limited range of funds (I’d say a choice of 30-40 max, without checking). My plan is to transfer the workplace assets annually into the SIPP where I can then put them into the ETFs of my choice.

retiringin26

Check which ScotEq funds you have, many aren't available on other platforms so you'd not be able to do an in specie transfer.if so.

poseidon1

A decent example of a fixed fee SIPP provider with more bells and whistle options than Fidelity, would be Interactive Investors.

Regardless of the size of your pension pot you would be looking at a flat monthly fee of £14.99 ( less than £180 p.a). That fee also covers ISA and general investment accounts, so all in all a competitive option for ' high rollers'.

cfw1994

Is another issue the actual mechanism for access?

Many other providers need you to sell down to ensure there is enough cash to pay you. That includes II, although I thinkVanguard and Fidelity can automatically work? Not sure where there is a definitive list of who does that somewhere 🤷‍♂️

I have Aviva for my main pot, but making changes is glacially slow and their customer service is awful: even second level phone support appear to be idiots who know very little about what is going on for my “new generation” pension (which is old).

However: on the bright side, the process is entirely automatic, with them selling down and paying me each month.
Plus my funds are performing pretty well, & I don’t easily see directly equivalent ETFs that are a direct match.  Funds being Aviva Global Equity, Aviva North American and the BNY Mellon Multi-Asset Balanced, which doesn’t appear to have a direct ETF equivalent 👀

Good luck, you certainly have a decent chunk to live off, & stepping back as kids stop Uni is what I did, although I had consolidated my older funds perhaps 10 years earlier into my work pot.

Albermarle

A decent example of a fixed fee SIPP provider with more bells and whistle options than Fidelity, would be Interactive Investors

I would be interested to know what these extra bells and whistles options are ?

hara____

If you haven't already, it's worth checking whether any account has special protections, such as a protected pension age. As cfw1994 suggests, it's not only about fees.