Cheap Personal Pensions

[unixman]

Saturday night. Obviously I am "vogueing" in an exclusive Newcastle nightclub, but have just popped into the chillout room to gather my thoughts on pensions. After rifling the forum's search facilities to no avail, I turn to CUK members for an answer.

I want to move my pension from the poor place it is now (a decade old Standard Life policy that is probably bleeding my future dry) to a place with lower charges.

Here's a little tempter from Cavendish online. They give an example charge of £163.50 on a pot of £20000, works out at 0.82%. Seems cheap, right enough.

How does your scheme measure up ? I don't have the time for SIPP, however good it is, I am just looking for the cheapest managed scheme in which to dump an existing 100k pot, before abandoning this pension stuff next year in favour of BTL or other plan B. (I am 48).

Sirs, I remain your faithful and obedient servant,
Unixman.

[AMH]

The new pension rules so you can access your Pot comes into effect in April.
However, you can't access your pot until your 55 - not sure if you was planning on accessing your pension funds for a buy to let - or just abandoning your pension completely in favour of putting the money into a BTL instead.

[v8gaz]

IPSE member? IPSE are about to launch a pension service which might just beat that rate. I@d maybe hold off for the details on that one.

[unixman]

Thanks AMH & v8gaz. Will check out IPSE. I am not planing to take anything from the pension or retire early. Just planning to put my money into BTL in future (or other plan B) rather than continue topping up the pension. Or maybe both if I can afford it.

(Personal) pensions appear to suck for the last 20 years or so. My pension has struggled to beat inflation over the last 9 years. The only thing going for it is the tax advantages. Whether or not that makes up for the poor performance I don't know. Where retirement planning is concerned, better to have more than one iron in the fire I guess.

[FarmerPalmer]

I would start be reading these:

Personal pensions | This is Money

Stakeholder pensions: the cheap and simple way to invest for your retirement | This is Money

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/p...l-pension.html

The best pension providers of 2014 | Moneywise


I have a stakeholder pension funded by my employer (a company I also happen to be the main shareholder and director of) rather than personally.

[TheFaQQer]

If you're in Newcastle, I can put you in touch with my guy at St James Place for a free consultation - he's based in Chester-le-street and I've been happy with the advice that I've had from him.

PM me if you're interested.

[BolshieBastard]

Saturday night. Obviously I am "vogueing" in an exclusive Newcastle nightclub, but have just popped into the chillout room to gather my thoughts on pensions. After rifling the forum's search facilities to no avail, I turn to CUK members for an answer.

I want to move my pension from the poor place it is now (a decade old Standard Life policy that is probably bleeding my future dry) to a place with lower charges.

Here's a little tempter from Cavendish online. They give an example charge of £163.50 on a pot of £20000, works out at 0.82%. Seems cheap, right enough.

How does your scheme measure up ? I don't have the time for SIPP, however good it is, I am just looking for the cheapest managed scheme in which to dump an existing 100k pot, before abandoning this pension stuff next year in favour of BTL or other plan B. (I am 48).

Sirs, I remain your faithful and obedient servant,
Unixman.

48 and in an exclusive toon night club? Yeah right. Tuxedo Royale sailed years ago!

[unixman]

@FarmerPalmer - Thanks I will check through those articles. I have read many pension articles on ThisisMoney and elsewhere, but all they usually do is explain the basic mechanics of pensions. They rarely compare the cost of competing schemes, or talk about charges beyond a passing mention. Whereas a tiny difference in charges (eg 0.1%) could make a huge difference to what you get in retirement.

Part of the reason that articles skim over costs is that the overall cost of any pension is all but impossible to know. The providers use a combination of obfustication and secrecy to ensure this information never gets out. And rather than just send you a bill every year, they quietly abstract their charges from your overall pot. You never get to know what the overall charge was. How this can be legal I don't know. It is a bit like me just being allowed to raid my client's bank account rather than sending them an invoice. But then, the pensions industry is yet another feather-bedded City of London industry, which... [rant continues at some length]

@TheFaQQer - Chester-le-Street - know it well, but sadly living darn sarf now, so your Chester chap does not quite fit the bill, thanks anyway. Okay the night club was actually in Bedford, I just said Newcastle to sound classy. Hey, everyone does it on the internet.

[FarmerPalmer]

Interestingly the new IPSE scheme looks to be with Aegon, who I am currently with for my stakeholder, and would recommend:

https://www.ipse.co.uk/news/2015/ips...sletter_11_Dec

I have a fund with them which is performing quite well, and with low management fees.

[v8gaz]

Out of interest, what fees are you paying currently with Ageon?