Pension fund performance - do you monitor yours, how is it doing, do you actively change it?

@dlockers I can enquire about moving to a gross payment scheme but wanted to be armed with the correct information and understanding which I think I know now given that it is RAS.

When I asked in the past I was told I could do a salary sacrifice and would therefore need to find out whether that is done at gross and therefore no relief to claim.

My assumption again on that front is I work out how much I need to give up to go back to 20% and let them work it out and sacrifice accordingly per month?
 
ddoubleep said:
@dlockers I can enquire about moving to a gross payment scheme but wanted to be armed with the correct information and understanding which I think I know now given that it is RAS.

When I asked in the past I was told I could do a salary sacrifice and would therefore need to find out whether that is done at gross and therefore no relief to claim.

My assumption again on that front is I work out how much I need to give up to go back to 20% and let them work it out and sacrifice accordingly per month?
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Yeah exactly -- so I take my salary and subtract from the boundary, then divide by 12 and set that.

Worst case scenario you can always do a one-off payment in March when you know where you will land.
 
AFAIK the government has either tied, or is trying to tie, the work pension access age to be 10 years max before the state pension age i.e.

State Pension age - 66 = able to access work pension from 56
State Pension age - 71 = able to access work pension from 61

Not sure if this also affects private pensions?
 
throwaway4372 said:
I've never heard of a protected pension age before. Can't see any mention of it in my pension docs. Internet says it doesn't apply to most people, so that would explain why.
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Incorrect, it applies to many or most schemes joined prior to November 2021. Both my Aviva and my Fidelity schemes are protected at 55 for example, and they are very large providers. Who is your provider?

www.gov.uk

PTM062215 - Member benefits: pensions: protected pension age: right to take benefits before age 57 - HMRC internal manual - GOV.UK

www.gov.uk www.gov.uk
 
@dlockers some more reading led me to this also:
you can reduce your ‘adjusted net income’ by making a pension contribution either as part of an occupational pension scheme or a personal pension, and so reduce the tax charge payable.

I had not originally been calculating what I already put into my work scheme to offset the income to bring to the lower tax bracket. This means I can put a lower value in the SIPP for now to bring it down until figure out next year and the % increase. Still awaiting HR to tell me about the salary sacrifice at gross along with if they can add the saved NI.
 
Richie said:
AFAIK the government has either tied, or is trying to tie, the work pension access age to be 10 years max before the state pension age i.e.

State Pension age - 66 = able to access work pension from 56
State Pension age - 71 = able to access work pension from 61

Not sure if this also affects private pensions?
Click to expand...

It does indeed affect them.
There are circumstances that allow earlier withdrawal but they are not situations you want to be in (such as terminal illness).

The issue is trying to stop people being dumb basically.
Its hard enough to get people to save properly, if they could take it out you just know people would be blowing it on cars and holidays etc.
 
EvilRob said:
Incorrect, it applies to many or most schemes joined prior to November 2021. Both my Aviva and my Fidelity schemes are protected at 55 for example, and they are very large providers. Who is your provider?

www.gov.uk

PTM062215 - Member benefits: pensions: protected pension age: right to take benefits before age 57 - HMRC internal manual - GOV.UK

www.gov.uk www.gov.uk
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I have a Vanguard SIPP for consolidating pensions from previous employment, and a L&G pension for my current employer. I had neither of them in 2021.
 
If the government change the law in regards pensions then its the law.
There is no protection from this. Other than the government applying a get out or deciding its "unfair" to change the terms.

If the government decide to move the earliest age and apply it to all schemes retrospectively then the providers will follow that instruction. 100% guaranteed.
 
Losing a right to a protected pension age

A member may lose their protected pension age in the following circumstances.

The member transfers their pension rights to another pension scheme. Protection will be lost unless the transfer is a block transfer, or the member already has a protected pension age under the receiving scheme.
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Sauce: https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/pensions-tax-manual/ptm062210

Sounds like if I ever had it then I would have lost it by transferring. No idea if I ever had it. Not going to be prevented from transferring because of it. So makes no difference I guess.
 
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
If the government decide to move the earliest age and apply it to all schemes retrospectively then the providers will follow that instruction. 100% guaranteed.
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True, however they have not done this with the April 2028 rise to 57; members of schemes with unqualified right to take pension at 55 have a protected minimum pension age of 55. It even applies to future contributions.
 
throwaway4372 said:
Sauce: https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/pensions-tax-manual/ptm062210

Sounds like if I ever had it then I would have lost it by transferring. No idea if I ever had it. Not going to be prevented from transferring because of it. So makes no difference I guess.
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Interesting, Fidelity's page says the following:
"If you transferred, or plan to transfer a pension to us, in full that has a Protected Pension Age, this will be retained on transfer. Protection only applies to those transferred funds and these will be separated from your pensions that you can access at 57. "
Gov.uk docs are obviously source of truth but I wonder where Fidelity is getting that info from.
 
ddoubleep said:
@dlockers some more reading led me to this also:
you can reduce your ‘adjusted net income’ by making a pension contribution either as part of an occupational pension scheme or a personal pension, and so reduce the tax charge payable.

I had not originally been calculating what I already put into my work scheme to offset the income to bring to the lower tax bracket. This means I can put a lower value in the SIPP for now to bring it down until figure out next year and the % increase. Still awaiting HR to tell me about the salary sacrifice at gross along with if they can add the saved NI.
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(y)

You can also donate to charity, get a cycle2work bicycle, an EV/company car or a few other things. But pension is generally the smartest :D
 
What's the general consensus on good fund performance? 10%? 20%?

I've never changed from my workplace default fund which is the Standard Life Sustainable Multi Asses Universal. In terms of working out performance, is it as simple as looking at the investment growth divided by my total contributions? If so, it looks like its returned a 20% increase.

Or is it not that simple?
 
I have the same standard life one. Still not sure if I should change it. Fees are reasonable as they're discounted. Could be a big win or a huge mistake to fiddle with it.
 
SAM81 said:
What's the general consensus on good fund performance? 10%? 20%?

I've never changed from my workplace default fund which is the Standard Life Sustainable Multi Asses Universal. In terms of working out performance, is it as simple as looking at the investment growth divided by my total contributions? If so, it looks like its returned a 20% increase.

Or is it not that simple?
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Do you get an annual statement? There should be some details on there as to the performance of the fund. Also note that it’s better to look at fund performance over more than a year and to compare it to other funds (as lots of funds will have had significant jumps last year).
 
SAM81 said:
What's the general consensus on good fund performance? 10%? 20%?

I've never changed from my workplace default fund which is the Standard Life Sustainable Multi Asses Universal. In terms of working out performance, is it as simple as looking at the investment growth divided by my total contributions? If so, it looks like its returned a 20% increase.

Or is it not that simple?
Click to expand...

Its unclear what timeline you are talking over here.
But generally no.
You need to weight the contributions, eg the ones you paid in say 10 years ago have had a long time to compound where as the ones you paid in a month ago have only had one month.

Most if not all funds should publish a fund performance sheet anyway which will tell you.
 
Told a colleague to check their pension who is nearing retirement and he found his pot was sat in a 100% cash fund. To say the least it only made 4% increase over the past year and cumulative was 2.5 something percent over the past 5 years. No idea how it just went to that. Just putting it here as another reason to really check over where and what. your funds are to avoid missing out on any growth or shifting pots around into different % with some risk and safe options. His risk was 1 as never bothered to check.
 
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