General Chat

A bit of a personal rant this. I cannot understand why the government insists that everyone should take out a pension plan for their old age. I did this at the age of 34, I'm now 57. I paid in the maximum amount I could percentage wise for every year I worked. Now I have chosen to take early retirement, I find that rather than the quarter million pounds the projections promised me there is a piddling £74,000 in there. Of this 74,000 there is only 47,000 I can access at the moment, the rest has to wait until I'm 60. This £47,000, rather than buy me the Grand pension of £15,000 a year which I was promised will buy me £3000 a year, or if I take a lump sum of £8,800 a pension of £2400 a year! Now the government cannot guarantee returns on investments, cannot control the greed of insurance companies and investment consultants. And cannot guarantee what annuities will be in 25 years time! Why the hell should anyone invested a pension?

Andy Basically if a young person now doesn't invest in a pension then they will be very poor in their old age. The fact that you (and many others) were caught by the double whammy of poor investment returnd and low annuity yields does not mean that it was a bad investment - just not as good as you were led to believe.

So Bob, what about the future? Who can guarantee the value of investments and the returns when you draw on them? I invested for a total of 23 years, the wisdom is that over a period of time things even out - but they don't! I think the Government is being over optimistic in suggesting that if young people take out pensions they will have a secure old age. The only people who get rich from that are the financial consultants! Sorry, you aren't one are you?

Wendy, to be honest it's all worked out ok, my wife worked for BP, we put as much as we could into their final earnings scheme and that has paid off rather well, plus we have a lot of other investments which have paid the mortgage a long time ago and now give us a good income. But if we had just paid into money purchase pensions as the Government advises we'd be stuffed!

Clare I agree with everything you say, glad you wrote it all out and not me.

My husband was made redundant and with the advice of a financial advisor who said that the former Company's pension fund could not grow, he transferred his pension to a 'personal pension' - what a big mistake. He has been fighting now for over six years as being 'mis-sold'. The Financial Ombudsman' agrees but the FA sold his business and ceased trading so it goes to another department and so on and so on. Its no wonder people don't invest - company pensions are fine - personal pensions have so many loop-holes - you can see the reasoning behind investing in property.

The government wants us all to invest in personal pensions to save themselves the embarrassment of admitting there's not enough in the pot to pay everyone a state pension. I have worked for over 40 years, even bringing up a family I did part time jobs. I have asked for a pension forecast from the Min of Pensions or whatever they call themselves and I am entitled to the princely sum of £11.45 per week. This is because I paid "Married Woman's Stamp" for years, paying only in my own right after my husband of 25 years decided he wanted something a bit younger than me. Because he has remarried, I am not entitled to any of his Graduated Pension. Tough luck me! If I had my time over again, I wouldnt buy a pension but I'd certainly invest, either in property or Gold, knowing what I know now.

You started it!! A couple years ago my hubby was paying just under 46 pds a week NH, one day he crushed his hand in a machine at work, we were "allocated" 34.88 pds a week!!! Endownments! Took out an endownment mortgage, as everyone was advised to in 1987! legislation (spelling is probably wrong) came out 1988, so can't fight it!!! Pension! Hubby pays in over 200 pds a month and forcast says............. £170 a month when he is 65, wow!!!! Shares! Invested & Lost!!!!!!! House!!!!! Bricks & Mortar are worth zilch!!! Do I go on? Sorry to moan but we have tried over the years to make our lives easy, comfortable, in the future and what for??

We have to invest in our futures. In twenty years time, there will be so many of us post retirement age and so few in full time employment that the value of our pensions will be even less than they seem now. My personal pension will be nowhere near what I was promised, but I will not be alone in this. If you reckon that growth and inflation balance each other over time, the maximum you can save in a pension is not going to be enough to keep you in retirement unless you reckon that retirement will be approximately a quarter of your working life. Not a cheerful thought, but the maths just don't stack up for paying very little in and spending nearly half our adult life in retirement. Brenda

I think the system in Singapore is interesting. Basically, you pay ten per cent of your gross earnings into a compulsory savings account. You are allowed to draw a maximum of two years in a lifetime unemployment benefit and sickness benefit. The rest is viewed as your savings for your old age. This certainly seems fairer to me, although I dont know what happens to those who never work at all - or perhaps they havent got many of those?

But Brenda, HOW MUCH DO WE INVEST? We all still have to live today as well. Kids education, and they have to go onto higher education or get nowhere, but I for one do not want to see mine start out in life with a 10,000 pds or more defecit. Don't know if this is for all, but, as far as I know, MP's don't pay into a pension so they have nothing to worry about when they retire, we do! so where is that money coming from?

Where I work they provide a good pension - if you work for them for 25 years!! I was a single mum for years, (no fault of mine) and worked in schools, term time only for a pittance, so I could be with my children in the holidays - couldn't afford the pension then) I started working full time for the council in 2002 - and was made redundant in July this year cos they decided to move the office to the middle of nowhere - and I don't drive!! I'm really glad I didn't allow them to take £80 off me a month for my pension cos if they're going to b*gger about and move the office - where does that leave me??? Can't get a job now - ageism rules. Apparently my grey hair (which I've had since 30 - but no longer dye brown) indicates that my brain is dead, despite getting a degree at the age of 43!! And not driving is a major sin!!!!!! Thoroughly Peed off maggie

Andy, Makes you wonder what National Insurance is for doesn't it!! Slightly calmed down (but still just about unemployed) maggie

My money is going under the bed from now on. Pensions are not worth the paper they are written on. Endowments are just as bad. This country is becoming a bloody disgrace. I could run it better. Ooh is the Abuse Manager out there. Is this message going down the drain too. I didn't mention those very rich Gypsies!

Pensions and endowments are a joke. My money is going under the floor boards.

And think about this folks. Who the hell on an average earnings of £23,000 can afford to: A. House themselves B. Feed themselves C: Start a Family D: AND put something away for their old age! And yes, it does seem to me the more you try to look after yourself the more the Government milks you, taxes on Pension Funds for one thing! Handouts to people who shouldn't be here, ie "Asylum seekers" and other euphimisms for Illegal Immigrants etc. Support for the legions of single mums who get up the duff so they can get housed. Benefit payments to people who are rolling in "cash in hand" In many ways I think the Britain we want is down the pan.

I'm sorry Wendy, are you being cynical?

Wendy. Apologies to you about the angry attitude I took toward you re the Bush election and Iraq etc. I can be an opinionated git!

Oh dear. I am not a financial advisor I drive a truck for a living. Judging from your comments and those of many others it seems that economics and arithmetic has been very badly taught for many years. The government does not and never has had a pension “pot”. NI is just income tax with slightly different rules and today’s pensions are paid out of today’s taxes. The problem is that because we all expect to live longer there will eventually be too many pensioners for the working population to support. This government’s “prudent” policies have made most people reluctant to save for their old age. At today’s prices if you will have less than about £90,000 in your pension pot you are wasting your money because you would be better off on means tested benefit. How anyone can start a family and buy a house these days beats me but they do. A young person, starting work today, must start the habit of saving for their old age right from the beginning. It doesn’t have to be a pension scheme but should be tax free and hard to get at for obvious reasons. The alternative is to assume that the government in 2070 will pay a state pension that is enough to live on. The people who are worst off are those in their 30s and 40s. Most of them don’t really have enough time to save a substantial pension fund but have no way of knowing what the government will do during the next 20 years. I expect that by then the normal retirement age will be nearer 70 than 60. Of course there are many of us who don’t actually want to retire at 60 or 65. I for one have every intention of working as long as I can, although gradually cutting the hours. There have been a couple of rants in this thread about immigrants, gypsies, single mothers et al. I have deleted my original comment about this because it was too exteme. I would have though that our researches would have shown that one or all of the above feature in most of our own family trees so let's show a bit of tolerance Bob

Bob, I entirely agree. So why is the Government: A. Being dishonest about the schemes they are trying to get people to buy into, why not just make saving tax free and easy. B. Not helping people who have made the effort and have fallen foul of economic circumstance. Oh no it's 'cos people like you don't want to finance the demographic timebomb!