Pensions management - SJP etc

[jinkster]

Hi all,

Who does anyone recommend for pension management etc for growth? A few guys at work use SJP and have been impressed with results. Some reviews online read horrific. Fees high but growth of 18% over the last 12 months. My current Fidelity funds (unmanaged) are showing 9.5% growth. Even with fees SJP seems a no brainer but be interested to hear of opinions. I'm 42 yrs old so not drawing anytime soon.

Thanks.

[dalenorth]

You need to be cautious of SJP in terms of fees and exit. I have lady IFA we have used for our clients for years, so happy to make an intro if you want to drop me a pm.

[xeny]

jinkster said:

Hi all,

Fees high but growth of 18% over the last 12 months.

I'd be more interested to see what they've done over the past decade, including maximum drawdown. To give an example I've an investment that is 106.18% up over the past 3 years, but only 85.47% up over the past 5. It's easy to cherry pick a benchmark duration to make a volatile asset look great.

Keep in mind that the return you get is (underlying investment performance - fees), so starting out by picking a service known for high fees seems like going horse racing and starting by taking one of the horse's legs off.

[C69]

Looking at SJP's own figures, none of its pension funds appear to have achieved a 0-12 month discrete performance of +18%. However, a couple - SJP Japan and SJP UK Equity Income - have exceeded +16%.

https://www.sjp.co.uk/individuals/fund-prices/pens...

It'd be interesting to see which funds your friends are holding to achieve the returns that they claim.

As with any pension provider, costs are a critical consideration. Not only the ongoing costs while you're building up your pension pot, but any costs associated with drawdown when you retire too.

In the case of SJP, paying an initial 'advice charge' of 4.5% and initial 'product charge' of 1.5% would be instant red flags for me.

[Notsofastfrank]

The biggest Red Flag for you or anybody else considering SJP is that they are not independent. SJP “advisers” are just salesmen for SJP funds, you have no choice. Speak to a real IFA.

[jinkster]

A couple of friends are in the Polaris 4 fund and looking at like for like based on my Fidelity self chosen funds.

[mikeiow]

jinkster said:

A couple of friends are in the Polaris 4 fund and looking at like for like based on my Fidelity self chosen funds.

Polaris 4?
Looks like 8.2% growth over the past 12 months, according to them

Where are they claiming 18%?!
Maybe they are including their active contributions to skew things.

As said above: find a real IFA. Or continue to DIY - you already appear to be beating them!

[911hope]

jinkster said:

Hi all,

Who does anyone recommend for pension management etc for growth? A few guys at work use SJP and have been impressed with results. Some reviews online read horrific. Fees high but growth of 18% over the last 12 months. My current Fidelity funds (unmanaged) are showing 9.5% growth. Even with fees SJP seems a no brainer but be interested to hear of opinions. I'm 42 yrs old so not drawing anytime soon.

Thanks.

Look at performance of funds over a much longer term. Use proper data to do this and not anecdotes.

Consider the impact of charges over the long term.
Do the basic maths to understand the compounding impact of charges. Eg. 1% annually applied over 20 years leaves for pot reduced by 1- 0.99^20=??

[PistonHead007]

Notsofastfrank said:

The biggest Red Flag for you or anybody else considering SJP is that they are not independent. SJP advisers are just salesmen for SJP funds, you have no choice. Speak to a real IFA.

Spoiler alert...there is no such thing as truly independent.

Even a so called IFA will be working off a relatively narrow range of common go to products/investments. So whilst they have the ability to recommend anything, they'll in effect still be using a panel like a restricted adviser.

Nothing wrong with using a panel, so long as it's got good stuff on it. Which SJP's does not.