Over 50's club

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GregP Jul 2020 12:08pm, 9 Jul 2020 121,199 posts	0 GregP HoD's second paragraph strikes a chord. I'm basically a social animal and working from home isn't making me look forward to retirement...
um Jul 2020 12:17pm, 9 Jul 2020 2,895 posts	0 um Final salary pensions can vary - my first one (from 1978 to 1988) had a locked in 2.5% increase per year. Which was great, in theory, until the company & scheme went bust in 2004. Although FAS will bail out some, they won't cover the 2.5% increase. The actual pension I get now (for work from 1988 to 2017) has 5 different components (time based and AVC based) with different rules for increases for each. Increases for about 10 years of it are 'at the company's discretion', which surprisingly hasn't been that great. A steady and consistent 'zero'. Not too bad for me, but some, with a lot more years, have lost 40-50% of real value.
Bazoaxe Jul 2020 12:35pm, 9 Jul 2020 16,909 posts	0 Bazoaxe Dv, it all depends on the scheme. The one I am in is closed and based on my salary at the point it closed. However at the trustees discretion there is an annual increase applied. The discretion bit is a worry as hey could decide not to increase, but in practice they do seem to apply an increase every year. I am surprised though that a pension can be 'lost'. The only time it should be lost is if the person forgets where its held.
Cerrertonia Jul 2020 12:43pm, 9 Jul 2020 12,900 posts	0 Cerrertonia There is a (free) government pension tracing service which can help with lost pensions. Any payments into pensions over the years would've had a national insurance number associated with them and been noted for tax purposes, so it shouldn't be possible for them to be properly lost.
Dvorak Jul 2020 12:47pm, 9 Jul 2020 20,155 posts	0 Dvorak Thanks all. I expressed surprise that the civil service, much of which is about record keeping, should lose their own records. My friend wasn't nearly as surprised.
Angus Clydesdale Jul 2020 1:53pm, 9 Jul 2020 18,825 posts	0 Angus Clydesdale I spent 20 years working with the Civil Service. I’m not surprised either.
Lip Gloss Jul 2020 2:53pm, 9 Jul 2020 42,015 posts	0 Lip Gloss I’ve been a lazy git and only worked part time since my son was born 32 years ago so doubt my pensions will be up to much. Half of ex’s is my best one and it was making great progress until March . I do receive £50 a month on a small one I had when I worked in retail ( also was given a wee lump some )
Velociraptor Jul 2020 4:07pm, 9 Jul 2020 47,526 posts	0 Velociraptor My final salary pension will be based on my final salary before leaving the scheme. I was advised to delay applying for it until the accounts for my last full year in the scheme were finalised, because my income for that year was unusually high due to me having worked extra sessions to compensate for my colleagues being lazy jobsworths and refusing to work more than three days a week even when we needed all hands on deck.
Flatlander Jul 2020 5:09pm, 9 Jul 2020 1,742 posts	0 Flatlander My NHS final salary pension was based on the best of my last 3 years. However, a little bit similarly to V'rap, it also included the on-call call outs (but not the on-call stand-by because that was deemed to be not work). There were only 3 of us taking part in the on-call system so my call out payments amounted to a reasonable amount. However, being one of only 3 contributed to the stress and exhaustion which eventually drove me out.
Stander Jul 2020 5:16pm, 9 Jul 2020 54 posts	0 Stander 2 years and 220 days and I can take a lump out of reasonable pension pot that will leave us completely debt free and my wife able to retire fully. Can't wait. I'll basically be working to pay for holidays, etc. Might quit my career and go stack shelves at Tesco's for a less stressful life. Of course, if MIL would oblige by pegging it before then, we can do this once heritance gets paid out.