Minimum standards if you don’t want too much choice
Stakeholder pensions are a form of Defined Contribution personal pension. They have low and flexible minimum contributions, capped charges, and a default investment strategy if you don’t want too much choice. Some employers offer them, but you can start one yourself.
A personal pension is a type of Defined Contribution (DC) pension. You choose the provider and make arrangements for your contributions to be paid. If you haven’t got a workplace pension, getting a personal pension could be a good way of saving for retirement.
A secure income for life
A Defined Benefit (DB) pension scheme is one where the amount paid to you is set using a formula based on how many years you’ve worked for your employer and the salary you’ve earned rather than the value of your investments. If you work or have worked for a large employer or in the public sector, you may have a DB pension.
With a Defined Contribution (DC) pension, you build up a pot of money that you can then use to provide an income in retirement. Unlike Defined Benefit schemes, which promise a specific income, the income you might get from a DC scheme depends on factors including the amount you pay in, the fund’s investment performance and the choices you make at retirement.
Annual and lifetime limits to consider
Tax relief means some of your money that would have gone to the Government as tax goes into your pension instead. You can put as much as you want into your pension, but there are annual and lifetime limits on how much tax relief you get on your pension contributions.
The new pension savings market offers much more flexibility and choice post–6 April this year, which is a positive, but it can be overwhelming. For people planning for retirement in the new world of pension freedoms, there are both risks and opportunities – from passing on your pension to loved ones, to making the most of tax relief.
An unintended consequence of the pension reforms is that any divorcee with a pension earmarking order may need to act fast to protect their benefits. Any earmarking order that provides the ex-spouse with a fixed percentage of the pension income in retirement should be checked to ensure benefits are protected now that the member no longer needs to take their pension as an income and can instead take all the cash out as a lump sum.
Which UK companies have investment company managers been favouring? With the UK in the spotlight, the Association of Investment Companies (AIC) has published details of which UK companies are held by the highest number of investment companies in their top holdings.
More than one in ten (12%) 20-35 year olds are prepared to ask their parents to access pension savings to help pay for a mortgage deposit, research from Old Mutual Wealth[1] shows. But only half as many over 55s are willing to use their pension to help children or grandchildren buy a home.
UK parents spend around £35,000 on their children by the time they reach their fifth birthday, according to research released by Aviva. This adds up to a total of more than £28 billion[1] spent on the nation’s 4 million under-fives each year.