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What To Do With Zurich

NegevSouth
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What To Do With Zurich

#208201

Postby NegevSouth » March 17th, 2019, 2:17 pm

I have a Zurich Pension Fund (sedol 0406181). It originated from being contracted out 20 years ago and was set up with the old Allied Dunbar. It's a defined contribution.

Recent statement gives a value of £50k. I have no other pension apart from state pension and being 65, I am intending to retire in the next 12 months. Zurich contacted me to ask what my intention is, so I told them to keep it as it is meanwhile and I'll revert. The fund's value has grown quite nicely over the past 10 years.

I cannot access it directly through Zurich, which means that at some time in the near future I will need to transfer it to another provider. Can I do this myself without the big expense of an IFA? Is it better to transfer now or wait until I want a yearly income from it, starting say in 2021?

When I do eventually access it, is my following rationale reasonable?
Personal tax allowance: £13750. State pension: £9100. Annual drawdown of £4650 before tax. £50000/£4650 = 11 years.

steelman99
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208214

Postby steelman99 » March 17th, 2019, 3:28 pm

dont forget 25% of what you take out as drawdown will be tax free so you can take it over 8 years and pay no tax you want a larger income in the early years of retirement

37500/4650 =8.06 ( other£12500 will be tax free so can be taken up front , or a bit every year )

Raptor
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208215

Postby Raptor » March 17th, 2019, 3:31 pm

I transferred over £126K from 3 DC pots with no problem. Opened up a SIPP with Hargreaves, they did all the work and then moved it to drawdown once the money was there, I did take the 25% straight away though (tax free), but I could have elected for any amount. Shouldn't be a problem. Not sure about the amounts though as all mine invested in ITs and HYP Shares. I get about £7K from that lot in divis.

Raptor.

NegevSouth
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208268

Postby NegevSouth » March 17th, 2019, 7:43 pm

Raptor wrote:I transferred over £126K from 3 DC pots with no problem. Opened up a SIPP with Hargreaves, they did all the work and then moved it to drawdown once the money was there, I did take the 25% straight away though (tax free), but I could have elected for any amount. Shouldn't be a problem. Not sure about the amounts though as all mine invested in ITs and HYP Shares. I get about £7K from that lot in divis.

Raptor.


Is there a cost to transfer to Hargreaves? What about their on going charges to manage the fund? I heard that they are more expensive compared to AJ Bell for example?

Once in drawdown with an SIPP, does the balance still have the potential to increase year on year? In which case, maybe it's best for me to transfer now rather than wait.

Raptor
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208276

Postby Raptor » March 17th, 2019, 8:33 pm

My charges are £200 a year. Seems good to me. You get what you pay for.
My portfolio follows the vagaries of the stock market......

Raptor.

Chrysalis
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208352

Postby Chrysalis » March 18th, 2019, 10:21 am

Yes you can transfer it yourself without paying an IFA. Shop around for the kind of set up that suits you and pay attention to the charges. Money Advice Service has a list of all providers currently offering drawdown. You will need to take responsibility for choosing the investments yourself to suit your risk level, and for deciding how much to draw down, keeping an eye on how the funds are growing, or not.

Have a look at these sites for a bit more info, fairly basic but a reasonable place to start. You should also take up the free Pensionwise appointment which will explain all the options you have.

https://www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk/e ... e-drawdown

https://www.pensionwise.gov.uk/en/brows ... sion-money

scrumpyjack
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208356

Postby scrumpyjack » March 18th, 2019, 10:34 am

I transferred 2 personal pension to HL with no problems and without IFAs being involved. In both cases they paid me £500 cash incentive for transferring. As I don't invest in funds, the costs of having the money with them are pretty reasonable (£200 pa). I invested them in ETFs, investment Trusts and individual shares. It is nice to see that they have done better than if I had left them where they were.

Haven't drawn anything from them yet.

NegevSouth
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208360

Postby NegevSouth » March 18th, 2019, 10:44 am

scrumpyjack wrote:I transferred 2 personal pension to HL with no problems and without IFAs being involved. In both cases they paid me £500 cash incentive for transferring. As I don't invest in funds, the costs of having the money with them are pretty reasonable (£200 pa). I invested them in ETFs, investment Trusts and individual shares. It is nice to see that they have done better than if I had left them where they were.

Haven't drawn anything from them yet.


Ah ok thanks for that. I will study their website together with the links what jabd2001 mentioned.
I just can't decide whether to transfer now or wait for a while as Zurich is doing alright.

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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208372

Postby puffster » March 18th, 2019, 11:38 am

I transferred my contracted out SERPS pension from Zurich (was originally Allied Dunbar like yours!) with no IFA involved a few years back. Zurich used a push system so I had to fill out forms from Zurich identifying the SIPP where the pension was going and had to answer lots of questions to prove I knew what I was doing but nothing difficult. I transferred as cash and it all went smoothly taking about 3 weeks.

Regards, Puffster

Chrysalis
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208432

Postby Chrysalis » March 18th, 2019, 4:01 pm

There's no rush to move it, you can take your time to make sure you know what you want to do. check out the charges you are currently paying and the investment choices available to you within the Zurich pension and then have a look round at other options.

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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#208573

Postby Loup321 » March 19th, 2019, 10:30 am

I've just started my first SIPP, and have a spreadsheet with all the charges assuming that my circumstances stay exactly the same until I retire (which they won't). On MY spreadsheet, with MY level of contributions etc, yes HL is more expensive than AJBell for a larger pot. In fact, once my pension pot gets to £50,000, I think that Charles Stanley Direct will be the cheapest for me assuming the charges stay the same and my contributions each month stay the same. However, as I'm just starting out with nothing to transfer in, HL is the cheapest and will remain so for 5 years or so. At a pot of £17,000 I should transfer to AJBell, and then at £33,500 I should transfer to Charles Stanley Direct. I'm fairly sure any transfer fees will be negligible compared with the hike in charges as the pot increases. I only looked at 5 providers, so definitely do your own research!

NegevSouth
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#209097

Postby NegevSouth » March 21st, 2019, 1:02 pm

With a SIPP, are there also Fund Managed Charges to pay, in addition to a provider's platform costs of approximately 0.25-0.45%?
If so how does one pay them? Are they taken off the value of the pot once a year or does one receive an invoice annually to include VAT as well?

Alaric
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Re: What To Do With Zurich

#209158

Postby Alaric » March 21st, 2019, 4:09 pm

NegevSouth wrote:If so how does one pay them? Are they taken off the value of the pot once a year or does one receive an invoice annually to include VAT as well?


As with all "funds", the investment management charges are accrued into the price. In effect they are taken out daily and cashed periodically one assumes. As regards charges made by platforms and for administration of SIPPs, there are at least two possible methods. One is that the charge is taken from the cash balance, the other that it is paid from non-SIPP funds by direct debit or otherwise.


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