USS was the subject of industrial action last year, I believe.
3) possibly increase AVCs further in my workplace pension. I’m still learning about how my pension works (it’s USS if that means anything to anyone), but it’s changed a lot recently. It’s a DB/DC hybrid and I have some DC contributions but am back to fully being DB other than my AVCs.
There's a structural issue with USS (the joint and several liability of the contributing employers ie academic institutions) which means it is probably unstable in the long term. John Ralph, formerly of Boots Pension Scheme, has written about it.
(Several colleges and universities are on the point of insolvency. 49 institutions to date have announced redundancies. This will have implications for the USS, although I am not sure exactly how it will work. A couple of Oxbridge colleges were wealthy enough to buy themselves out of USS to avoid the meltdown scenario).
From the point of view of a member:
- the DB benefits are worth having, but one can't count on the scheme continuing with them in the long run (vested benefits should however be protected)*
- DC of course is DC, and will be preserved
I don't know if there is any opportunity to "catch up" missing National Insurance contributions? Martin Lewis of Money Saving Expert had a video on this, and the government was forced to extend the window to do this by a year or so (ie to some time in early 2025?). It took me 2 hours of waiting to speak to someone on the call centre line (try from 8am) but it is well worth doing. Roughly £850 paid conveying £250 pa of benefit from age 67 (ie 1 year of missing NI payments towards your 35 years max for Basic State Pension). First step is to use your NI number to query your NI payment record online.
I also don't know how Social Security Equalization works with NI & State Pension. As US SS is usually much more generous, that's worth understanding as well. Whereas if you retire to Canada or Australia there's no agreement (your state pension is frozen as at time of emigration, but restored if you return to the UK), for EU and USA there is.
* the key difference v a US private sector pension fund is that benefits are indexed to inflation up to 5% pa (at least). That's a pretty important benefit. Also as it is now Career Average Salary, it's more portable v a Final Salary scheme. Each year, in effect, creates a new inflation-linked annuity based on your salary in that year, which is normally paid from State Pension Age (?) ie 67
Statistics: Posted by Valuethinker — Mon Apr 22, 2024 6:03 am — Replies 17 — Views 4011