Wife's pension options

[ChrisH72]

I was looking into my wife's pensions this morning as we were going through some financial stuff. She has absolutely zero interest in it whatsoever so I feel its on me to make decisions.

She is 47 and has two small DC pension pots. The larger is from her former employer DHL and looks to be quite a good scheme with decent performance over the years. It has 39k in it but is closed to contributions so she can't add to it. The other is with standard life and has 10k. I think she could add to that but she has never bothered. She's been self employed for the last 6 years and has no other pension as such. She does own a rental property which she lived in before we met and also has a large amount (6 figures) tucked away in various cash ISAs. I have made sure that she has moved these around for the best rates and they are now all paying just over 4%. She has just transfered some other cash to use her allowance for this year.

So what to do about the pension?

My first thought was to transfer both the DHL and the Standard life into a Sipp where she could continue to contribute. But I'm not sure that we should touch the DHL one. Its grown 20% in the last year so looks well invested. That's about all I know about it. Then the 10k in standard life, maybe just cash that in and open a S&S ISA in April as I have just done?

Any thoughts greatly appreciated.

[ferret50]

I would be inclined to open a SIPP for her, as even 'only' £5k a year will compound into a tidy sum by 'er retirement age.

[superpp]

compare the fees on each compared to a low cost SIPP.
Whatever the DHL pension is invested in should also be available in a new SIPP too?

[Early-bird]

Also check you won’t lose any protected retirement age if moving it, as that could be very valuable given your ages.

[C69]

ChrisH72 said:

Then the 10k in standard life, maybe just cash that in and open a S&S ISA in April as I have just done?

Cashing in a pension early probably won't be possible, given your wife's age. There are only a few situations that allow it (e.g. if suffering from serious ill health).

[ChrisH72]

C69 said:

ChrisH72 said:

Then the 10k in standard life, maybe just cash that in and open a S&S ISA in April as I have just done?

Cashing in a pension early probably won't be possible, given your wife's age. There are only a few situations that allow it (e.g. if suffering from serious ill health).

Yes I did think of that afterwards. Also I guess if you cash a pension in you pay income tax on it.

So it could be transferred to a Sipp?

I don't know exactly what the investment is with DHL, think it said global equities so probably just an index fund.

[Bazil Bush]

My understanding is if your wife’s still working self employed she can open a SIPP and claim back the tax relief on any future contributions

[993BPT]

superpp said:

compare the fees on each compared to a low cost SIPP.
Whatever the DHL pension is invested in should also be available in a new SIPP too?

The DHL Pension uses rebranded L&G funds. Performance will depend which funds are selected. The Lifestyle fund options have not performed well historically so if staying with the DHL DC perhaps look at switching to Freestyle and choose better performing funds.