Retirement

The Department for Work and Pensions has published a guide to help people understand more about pensions and saving for retirement.

After a long and (reasonably) quiet summer it seems the government, in particular the Department of Work and Pensions, has saved up all their best work for the autumn.

The government needs to confirm whether proposed personal accounts will be classed as an occupational scheme, and if so what level of consumer protection will be built into the scheme.

If a national scheme of personal accounts come into effect the focus should not be on low costs at the expense of good communication, says Winterthur Life.

A pension fund surplus could be one possible way of allowing one member of a small self-administered scheme to pass money to their spouse within the pension without falling foul of A-Day rules.

Despite the complications of the A-Day rules, there are still opportunities to help people maximise their pension contributions, claims Rowanmoor Pensions.

Draft amended regulations on how age discrimination will be applied to pensions could affect at least a third of pensions schemes, claims Mercer.

Legal and General is using a podcast to try and help people decide whether they should stay contracted out of the state second pension.

Another consumer survey suggests despite a desire to save, taxation and other factors mean most people will ultimately end up living in varying degrees of poverty in retirement.

The white paper pension reforms will not succeed if the government does not resolve the issue of compensation for workers who lost their pensions when schemes wound-up.