If you have a Final Salary (Defined Benefit) scheme that you are no longer an active member of you should at least review it.
Many people now feel choice and flexibility outweigh the guaranteed – but often restrictive benefits their scheme offers.
By transferring out of a final salary pension, the investment risk associated with the pension would then become your responsibility. On top of this, if your withdrawals are too high or your investments underperform, you could run out of money.
While for many, remaining where they are is the correct thing to do, there is a growing number of people looking to access the cash available by transferring into a UK approved modern flexible arrangement.
Transferring out of your pension now will have an impact on how much income you could receive in the future. But it doesn't mean that you have to retire just because you may have accessed the 25% tax free lump sum – or in fact any amount up to 100%.
It is a very complex area recognised by the government to the extent that anyone with a pension fund of £30,000 or more has to take financial advice.
We can help you through this. We will:
Any employer funded schemes, including Local Government schemes. Your benefits will historically be based on length of service and salary on leaving. There is a “promise to pay” or guaranteed level of income that you will receive at a given date. This degree of security is at the expense of flexibility in terms of when and how much cash or income is taken, and what can be passed on to a surviving spouse.
We are unable to transfer unfunded schemes such as public sector.
We believe that for anyone making that move away from a final salary scheme needs to feel confident in what happens to their money. The actual process of transfer is only the first step into a longer term relationship with you, where we agree the right investment strategy for you. More importantly we will help you manage your future retirement income with you. Flexibility also brings responsibility. We want to be sure that you fully understand the implications of when and how much money to draw from your new arrangement and most importantly the most tax efficient way of using your funds.
Our investment solutions are all UK approved schemes with a carefully selected range of funds that are designed for those who either still want to grow their funds (pre-retirement) or those who have started to access the benefits (post retirement). Our advisers all have the advanced qualifications required by our regulator to give advice in this area.