How much long-term planning have you done? I don’t just mean beyond Christmas and into next year but proper grown up long-term planning? I have some savings and have before written about why we should all have three months savings put away, but looking ahead to retirement who understands what they will get?
We all need to be financially educated and whilst most of us will check our payslips carefully or our bank accounts each month, how many of us really know how our pensions work and what the real money at the end will be? I was good as I opted to pay into my work pension as soon as I qualified as a teacher. Each month I would look at the column informing me how much was going into my pension, and whilst I dreamt of the designer bags that I could buy, I knew the money was better off going into my pension. As a part-time worker it was optional for me but I knew I would need more than a state pension to take care of me. I studied social policy at Uni and know that the state pension is not going to be enough in another 30 years. However, since leaving teaching, sorting out another pension is on my to do list. It has been on that to do list for the past few years.
I have had a public sector pension and I have been informed that my money is best staying where it is, and that I should start a new private pension from here forward. However, for many when you change jobs or careers – which is becoming increasingly common in today’s economy – you need to be educated on your pension provisions.
PensionBee have carried out research that shows the annual management fees of the big providers, and this can be seen in their first Robin Hood index. Did you know that leaving old pensions in dormant schemes could leave them susceptible to hefty fees, meaning that bit by bit the value of your pension could be getting eaten away? I didn’t realise this and I am sure many others don’t. For some reason we all seem to think our pensions can be sorted out later, and that later doesn’t matter until we are maybe into our 50’s. If we take this approach we are literally losing our money or we are certainly not making it work as hard as we can.
However, there are solutions. PensionBee can help you find and combine old pensions to maximise returns, and allow you to easily manage your retirement savings online. PensionBee has also put together a handy guide illustrating how some of the big players try to make the process of transferring old pensions as complicated as possible. Yet it should not be this way and it is really important that you look beyond this initial barrier because it is your money and it should be working for you.
PensionBee offers a personal pension product, promising no jargon, complicated paperwork or surprise fees. Instead it offers to find your old pensions and move them across to one of three good-value plans, managed by BlackRock and State Street – two of the largest money managers in the world. Once that is done, you will be kept in regular contact, your money will be tracked and it will be working hard to provide for your future.
On a personal note I will be looking at what I need to do from now, and for that PensionBee has a calculator that works backwards. I can input what money I want at the end and how many years I have to accrue that amount, and then it will inform me of what I need to be saving each month. This is what I need to do now as combining is not in my best interests, but again the PensionBee team would tell you that. It also demonstrates that it is never too late to start planning for your retirement and anyone can build up some pension for their future. We are in uncertain times financially and we cannot rely on the state to support us in old age, we are living longer and we will need more money to sustain us.
Leave a Reply