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The retirement risk assessment: Five pitfalls to avoid when you finish work

“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” Wise words from US Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, who is also attributed with coining the phrase: “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Safe to say, he liked being ready for whatever the future had in store for him. Which is exactly the attitude you need to have toward your retirement planning. There are five threats to your financial security in retirement and each can be prevented with a mix of financial planning…
21st March 2018

Will you regret saving too little for retirement? Make changes before it’s too late

Will the money you put away today be enough to live on when you stop working? For some people, the act of paying into a Workplace Pension each month feels like enough, but it might not be. According to an international study by Schroders; 88% of retired investors says that they regret not saving more, meanwhile: a quarter of those wish they had contributed “a lot more” The average investor currently puts away 11.4% of their annual income for later life This…
21st March 2018

Where does your pension go when you die?

If you have not yet reached retirement, it can be easy to put off thinking about who will get your pension when you die. However, for more than 750,000 people, the answer is not the person they would want to have it. (Source: Royal London) This is because they have not updated their expression of wish form, and therefore, their pension provider is operating on outdated or non-existent information. What is an expression of wish form? When you first joined a pension,…
21st March 2018

Do you know when you can access your pension? It might be later than you think

Pension Freedoms. They’ve been around now for nearly three years, and in that time, they have revolutionised pensions, providing choice and flexibility to those approaching retirement. In fact, during the first 15 months after Pension Freedoms came into effect, over £9.2 billion has been accessed (Source: Gov.UK). However, amid the growing awareness of Pension Freedoms, a new rule has gone (for the most part) largely unnoticed. Currently, the earliest that you can access your pension pot through Pension Freedoms is age 55,…
21st February 2018

Six tips to tie up your tax year

It’s almost April, and that means three things: Spring is on the way and you can start hoping for sunshine Supermarket shelves are full of Easter treats and chocolate The 2017/18 tax year is ending The new tax year might not bring the excitement and celebrations (or bank holiday) that the calendar New Year does, but it’s an important time to make sure that you are up-to-date financially. Your March checklist Throughout March, you should check that you have made the most of the annual…
21st February 2018

State Pension: More than half of people don’t know what they will get, or when

Last month, we looked at the reasons people might defer their State Pension. This month, we thought we’d look at a more fundamental question: How much could you get, and when? Research from B&CE shows 52% of non-retired adults are unsure of the age at which they will be able to start receiving their State Pension. Further to this, 55% don’t know how much the current weekly State Pension income is. This lack of knowledge is even worse among…
21st February 2018

Understanding Pension Freedoms: A lack of knowledge could cost you

Ignorance is not bliss when money is involved, especially when that money is supposed to support your lifestyle when you finish working. Research from Old Mutual Wealth shows that: 47% of 50-75-year-olds either haven’t heard of Pension Freedoms or don’t know how they affect their pension and options Almost two fifths (37%) say that they don’t know when or how they can use Pension Freedoms Why does that matter? Can’t we just let them carry on doing things the way they have always been done?…
23rd January 2018

Deferring your State Pension: Could it be a mistake?

Deferring, or choosing to take your State Pension at a later date has been a popular topic of late. Just last autumn, we explored the pros and cons of deferring, click here to read more. There are many reasons why you might choose to defer your State Pension. But a freedom of information request from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) has suggested that the number of people choosing to do so is decreasing. Just 11% of people in receipt of…
23rd January 2018

It’s the biggest threat to your wealth, but 62% of people don’t understand it…

It’s something so powerful that Albert Einstein called it the eighth wonder of the world, and for good reason, too. No, it’s not King Kong; but instead the much mightier concept of compound interest (which is far less likely to run amok in New York City). Compound interest is the return from an initial sum saved, plus the accumulated interest from previous periods of time. Think of it as interest on interest; gathering momentum slowly at first before snowballing into a significant amount over time.
23rd January 2018

15 things to do in the year before you retire

The way we work, and retire, is changing. Gone are the days when we would work in the same place for 40 years, reach the State Pension Age and collect a leaving present, never to return. More of us are now retiring early. While 60 to 65 is no longer seen as old, if you are to have a financially secure retirement it takes careful planning. That means thinking about things months, or even years before you plan to finish working. Using our knowledge and…
8th January 2018

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