Sorting out my pension
Discussion
Sorting out my pension has been on my to do list for a while, but after reading this article on BBC News earlier, I decided to do something about it.
I joined my work pension scheme at 28, in 2011. As the company had stitched us up withdrawing the previous DB scheme they contribute 8%. A few years ago I read on PH that to get an income roughly equal to what you earned whilst working your contributions should be about half of the age you were when you started the pension, so I'm contributing 6%, for 14% in total. These contributions seem to tally well with the numbers in the BBC article, which is a relief. I'll be taking a few months parental leave later this year, then going down to 4 days a week, so I need to decide if I need to decide what to do about my contributions, reduce them and have more in my pocket, or increase the percentage to match my current contributions.
When I started the pension we had a really good web interface, so I diversified half of the contributions into different funds, leaving the other half in the "consensus" default fund. However, a couple of years ago the web interface was taken away from us and we were left with the bongo Scottish Widows website - which is crap. Since that happened I haven't touched the funds, which considering the changes that have happened in the world, probably isn't the best idea.
Where can I get information about funds and more importantly what they cost? I want to see how the funds I've got are doing and ensure I'm minimising fees. It seems like I can only get a daily change figure from Scottish Widows.
If I decide that my funds need changing, should I be looking to split across geographical areas? Or include some property funds etc?
I joined my work pension scheme at 28, in 2011. As the company had stitched us up withdrawing the previous DB scheme they contribute 8%. A few years ago I read on PH that to get an income roughly equal to what you earned whilst working your contributions should be about half of the age you were when you started the pension, so I'm contributing 6%, for 14% in total. These contributions seem to tally well with the numbers in the BBC article, which is a relief. I'll be taking a few months parental leave later this year, then going down to 4 days a week, so I need to decide if I need to decide what to do about my contributions, reduce them and have more in my pocket, or increase the percentage to match my current contributions.
When I started the pension we had a really good web interface, so I diversified half of the contributions into different funds, leaving the other half in the "consensus" default fund. However, a couple of years ago the web interface was taken away from us and we were left with the bongo Scottish Widows website - which is crap. Since that happened I haven't touched the funds, which considering the changes that have happened in the world, probably isn't the best idea.
Where can I get information about funds and more importantly what they cost? I want to see how the funds I've got are doing and ensure I'm minimising fees. It seems like I can only get a daily change figure from Scottish Widows.
If I decide that my funds need changing, should I be looking to split across geographical areas? Or include some property funds etc?
Ginge R said:
Thanks, I can get a lot more information through Trustnet than Scottish Widows. It seems like I was right to look at it, some funds that had been doing well 2 or 3 years ago have been rubbish since I was last able to get information on them.Ginge R said:
How long does it normally take to receive their verification email to set up your account?Been waiting hours for mine to come through now.
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