As a young IFA back in early 1991, I sat down with a client who I had known for some three years at that point, to review his pension planning as he had just arrived at the time when he wanted to start drawing some of his pension income.
He had a fairly healthy fund for the time, some £211,000, which would be worth around £456,000 today (source: Office for National Statistics).
I duly took away all of his information and put together a detailed report to show him what his options were for taking income and capital from his pension. I felt sure he would be pleased.
However, after I had presented the various solutions available to him, he seemed rather perplexed and confused.
He then produced a pile of paperwork that, following our previous meeting, he had found buried deep in his filing cabinet and he asked would I please have a look through it.
When I examined the documents, I discovered some old statements which (to cut a long story short) meant that he had more in his pension funds than he had previously thought, in fact a great deal more! The funds were held across two further pension plans, which when combined amounted to an extra £250,000 (over £540,000 today). No wonder he had been perplexed!
Anyhow, we were able to absorb these new funds into his planning and went on to amalgamate all of his pensions together to reduce the charges and simplify the management of his overall fund.
In 1991 that was all quite a major task, very labour intensive, and took a long time to complete. Every company had to be contacted individually in writing and there was a stack of paperwork for each of my clients pension plans that needed to be completed and signed in order to achieve his new plan.
In 2020, I am delighted to say that this whole exercise is much quicker, simpler and convenient.
The award-winning team at our Wealth Management partners, Consulo Wealth Solutions, can help you to locate any “lost” plans, to make sure that you are not missing out on any of your hard-earned pension. Using the Ascot Wealth Platform, they can then offer you easy access to your combined pension funds, enable you to organise and track your investments conveniently online using your phone or your computer and get in touch with your financial adviser in an instant.
Consulo can also help you to get the most from your investment by working with Discretionary Fund Manager, Cape Berkshire, who run 5 risk-adjusted, multi-asset portfolios, on a discretionary basis for Consulo clients. You will be able to have full confidence that whichever portfolio Consulo places your funds in, it will be focused on achieving your medium to long term objectives that have been set out with you by your financial adviser.
So, if you have a number of pension plans that you have collected over the years and are looking towards retirement over the coming years, maybe now is the time to review those plans, combine them to reduce costs and take advantage of professional fund management which is geared to your personal goals and objectives.
It really could be time for you to take control!
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