Bitty Pensions

[itsybitsy]

I've been having a bit of a financial life laundry, which has been somewhat 'illuminating' for want of a better word. It began, in the main, because I received a statement from Aviva for a pension I don't even remember setting up, sometime in the late 90s. There's not much in it - and there won't be much more in it when I cash it in in 15 years, but it galvanised me into action to gather details of all my financial bits and pieces.

WELL! I've got five pots of varying sizes (before anyone comes for me, none of these pensions are going to enable me to live a life of grandeur in my old age, but they will just about keep the wolf from the door and enable me to go to bingo once or twice a month, when they are coupled with my state pension). But it got me thinking, the legacy pensions - the ones that I'm no longer paying into - are sat in funds that are probably not particularly lucrative and could likely be switched up to a better fund somewhere else, or even a different fund with the same provider. I know that you have to take into account transfer costs, annual fees and then a platform cost, but does anyone have any recommendations for funds that have/are performing well or decent providers just through your own experiences?

DISCLAIMER *I know this isn't official advice and I won't try to sue anyone*

[Ahastyatom]

Sorry I don't know anything about pensions but I know there are ways that you can get free financial advise through you pension provider/employer. So may be worth checking out

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisat ... dance-body

https://www.gov.uk/plan-retirement-inco ... ial-advice

[jennyjj01]

I've been having a bit of a financial life laundry, which has been somewhat 'illuminating' for want of a better word. It began, in the main, because I received a statement from Aviva for a pension I don't even remember setting up, sometime in the late 90s. There's not much in it - and there won't be much more in it when I cash it in in 15 years, but it galvanised me into action to gather details of all my financial bits and pieces.

WELL! I've got five pots of varying sizes (before anyone comes for me, none of these pensions are going to enable me to live a life of grandeur in my old age, but they will just about keep the wolf from the door and enable me to go to bingo once or twice a month, when they are coupled with my state pension). But it got me thinking, the legacy pensions - the ones that I'm no longer paying into - are sat in funds that are probably not particularly lucrative and could likely be switched up to a better fund somewhere else, or even a different fund with the same provider. I know that you have to take into account transfer costs, annual fees and then a platform cost, but does anyone have any recommendations for funds that have/are performing well or decent providers just through your own experiences?

DISCLAIMER *I know this isn't official advice and I won't try to sue anyone*

Hargreives Lansdown make the process easy and once invested, you can flip between underlying investments very easily.
You may be able to transfer actual investments across without having to liquidate them first.

Management charges won't be the cheapest, but not too bad.

https://www.hl.co.uk/pensions/transfer-to-the-sipp

[korolev]

My advice having retired early:
Your retirement can be broken down into sections which might look like :

• stop working full time
  stop working completely
  active retired
  less active retired
  inactive retired
  care needs

Before you do anything work out exactly where you are financially, where you want to be and do a timeline with the above in mind:

• How old are you ?
  When do you get your state pension and how much is it ?
  How much do you get from each pension pot and when do you get it ?
  Do you want an annuity (monthly payment for the rest of your life) or will you "draw down" (either regularly or from time to time) until the money runs out ?
  Will you need the same amount when you are 85 that you need when you're 65 ? (I reckon on needing quite a bit less as I probably won't drive or holiday as much).

For me, I retired early in 2019, between us we get about £17k pension and have a decent lump sum; our outgoings (needs+wants) are £20k so we're £3k short which we top up from our savings. However this is only for 8 years as when we both turn 65 (in 2030/2032), we'll get another £14k in state pensions.

[scoobie]

I had similar, I transferred them all to the pension I am actively contributing too. You don't really want to have 5 lots of pension admin fees to pay for. I think the transfers I did last year cost very little, or nothing depending on the pension provider.

Have a look at the recurring admin fees on the pensions you have, and also the transfer costs.

[Bad Wombat]

I would look at consolidating your individual schemes into a single SIPP. Go with whoever you think will be the cheapest given the total size of your pot. Fund wise I would stick with a low cost tracker based on one of the world indexes. There is a great reddit community where such things are discussed a lot here: https://www.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFina ... ch/?q=sipp. They always recommend comparing charges here: https://monevator.com/compare-uk-cheape ... e-brokers/. Vanguard, AJ Bell and iWeb seem to get recommended a lot, but it depends on your circumstances. I'm with the Halifax - which is just AJ Bell under another name. As for funds - look again on the reddit finance page for recommendations. Some of my stuff is currently in the Fidelity World Acc P fund (https://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/ ... F00000SRPN or https://www.google.com/search?q=https%3 ... cumulation if that link ever breaks). Any low cost world index tracker should do though.
Not a financial advisor. Do your own research. Best of luck.

[Bijela]

It's worth checking what type of pensions they are. There is something about defined pensions that makes them different. Mu pension is only going to have 10 years put in it.

[korolev]

It's worth checking what type of pensions they are. There is something about defined pensions that makes them different. Mu pension is only going to have 10 years put in it.

Yes, there are two types; defined benefits and defined contributions.
Defined benefits, also known as final salary schemes, give a set payment dependent on length of service and salary at retirement. Most of these schemes are now closed and the benefits are on hold (It is almost always a bad idea to transfer these to any other pension).
Defined contribution schemes invest your (and your employers, if relevant) contributions and build a personal "pot" which you can use in a number of ways, annuity, drawdown etc.

[Pete_59]

If you are living in the UK the retirement age isn't 65 anymore, I'm nearly 63 and I won't get the state pension until I'm 66.

[Arzosah]

If you are living in the UK the retirement age isn't 65 anymore, I'm nearly 63 and I won't get the state pension until I'm 66.

Well spotted, Pete. Retirement age has been 66 for a few years now.

Age UK: https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-ad ... nsion-age/

Calculator from the government: https://www.gov.uk/state-pension-age