Pension transfers – pure guesswork?

When it comes to suitable pension transfer transactions, “The comparison is everything.” Yet, despite the baffling array of new options for pensions brought in by the reforms of April 2015, we still lack reliable comparison tools. Further to our previous coverage [1], Adam Samuel provides the big picture on why pension transfers remain such an important, difficult and potentially toxic subject.

Adam SamuelBA LLM DipPFS MCISI FCIArb Certs CII (MP&ER) Barrister and Attorney may be contacted at adamsamuel@aol.com. For links to where you can buy the second edition of ‘Consumer Financial Services Complaints and Compensation’, see www.adamsamuel.com/book.

It was about 20 years ago. The Pensions Review was in full swing, generating costs to the industry that ended up being about £13.5 billion, to correct the damage done by transfers from pension schemes with guaranteed underpins, as well as opt-outs and non-joiners from any form of occupational scheme. The Chartered Insurance Institute organised a conference on pension transfers. They had to change the venue because so many people wanted to attend. The word ‘compliance’ was barely mentioned apart from a desultory half-hour presentation. The following year, the Institute had to cancel a conference on compliance in this area because nobody wanted to attend.