Pensioner Trustee at University of St.Andrews - Bill Blyth

Having taken early retirement I thought I might develop this page to help others approaching retirement, however anything included here is based on my personal experience and must not be taken as any form of expert legal opinion or financial advice.

These observations are for support staff at St.Andrews University and if you are not employed there then these arrangements may be different in your employers pension scheme. A general site that might be useful to look at though is http://www.fiftyforward.co.uk/

Thought 1

Apply to go on a pre-retiral course via the Pensions office, so contact Lisa Harley to see if any courses are planned and do this at least 3/4 years before your retiral date. The courses are run over in Dundee by the Tayside Pre-Retirement Council and are normally held in the Mitchell Street Centre and run over two days and transport can be made available at no cost to you.

Thought 2

The normal state retirement age for years has been 60 for females and 65 for males, but changes are in the pipeline. If you are a male retiring early then you may have to wait a few years before receiving your state pension, so working out a monthly budget is important. It is just as important even if you leave in receipt of a state pension. I certainly quickly realised how much I had been spending at work, between travel and lunches etc and how these savings impacted on my new monthly expenditure.

After age 60 you only pay tax on your pension, no National Insurance is deducted unless you have not achieved the required number of qualifying years, so need to contact the Jobcentre or Department for Work and Pensions In the event you do take up gainful employment this could mean payment of National Insurance on these earnings, You may also qualify for a Job Seekers allowance whilst looking for work and further information can be viewed on the DWP website.

Thought 3

An example for pension purposes of say a salary of £20,000 and 40 years service gives a pension of £10,000 per year and a lump sum £30,000. However new legislation now allows you to opt for a bigger lump sum with a correspondingly lower yearly pension e.g. £30,000 might realise up to £54,000 - but result in a much lower yearly pension. You could seek advice on other figures less than the maximum, to see how this would impact on your monthly pension payments.

For someone with only 20 years service then the pension would be £5,000 per year and lump sum of £15,000. The pension calculation is based on the last 365 days salary and not the annual salary, unless you are retiring on 31st July in that year. Normally annual salary runs from 1st August to 31st July.

If you retire on 31st August then your first pension payment will be at the end of September. The pension administrators will send to your home address a monthly pay slip not so different from the type you received whilst working and the money will be paid into your nominated account on the 27th of the month.

If you are to receive a State pension about  6 weeks before the member retires, the Tax Office will write asking for information regarding their State Pension. Once the member is in receipt of their State Pension they will advise the payroll department of the Pension Administrator.

In the case of a member taking early retirement they will receive a tax form asking about who pays the pension; its amount and other personal details.

The inflationary increase in your pension is effective from 1st April in line with the state pension arrangements. Every pensioner receives in April each year a revised pension. In the current year 2008/09 the full increase is 3.9% Those who have not been a pensioner for a full year will only receive a proportion of any increase, in the above example, 7/12ths or around 2.27% in the first year of pensionable income.

The pension increase on contributions prior to 1st April 2006 is inflation proofed up to 9% but pension contributions which accrue from 1st April 2006 to retirement date will only be increased by up to 2.5%, For example if you do receive the full 40/80ths and retire on 1st April, 2009 then 37/80ths will receive up to 9% cover and the final 3/80ths up to only 2.5%

The current state retirement pension as of April 2008 is £90.70 per week with a personal allowance for those of £9030 for the age group 65/75 then from 75+ an increased allowance of £9180. The current personal allowance for those under 65 is £5435 [in the current tax year this has been increased due to the loss of the 10p in the pound rate but may only apply for 2008/09] and this will apply to staff who have taken early retirement. Some staff will receive additional payments - one of which could be the old graduated pensions, but normally this is a very small amount. There is an income limit of £21,800 and if you receive monies in excess of this, then the personal allowance will be lowered. There are Annual earning limits as well as life time allowances on pensions nowadays but for most of us in the staff support scheme this is unlikely to be an issue.

In the case of female staff retiring at 60 with their university and full state pension, the yearly value of the state pension is deducted from their personal allowance leaving them with a much reduced personal allowance, until they reach 65 when they qualify for the higher personal allowance.

Thought 4

Give some thought to how best to deal with the lump sum you will receive, it will likely be the largest amount of cash most of us will ever receive. You might want to but a new car; pay off a mortgage; have work carried out on your home or perhaps go a holiday - one you will remember - or simply want to invest some or all of your lump sum. Seek out an Independent Financial Advisor; use one who is a FSA registered.
These sites might help you: www.unbiased.co.uk  or www.find.co.uk (a potentially useful website for finding authorised intermediaries) - and there are a few in St.Andrews and Dundee area who might assist you. Most charge a small one-off payment to set-up your managed fund and then a smaller amount per year for advising and supplying up-to-date statements on how your fund is performing. If the performance is good then these amounts are fairly trivial, they can also help you make payments into and out of your fund(s).

Thought 5

At age 60 you can also apply for your bus pass and cut down on the usage of your car, I know a number of people over 60 who now use their pass to get to and from work, plus the other use of seeing parts of Scotland. Some tour bus operators also give you a discount on their trips and there are concessions in Fife to enable "Fife Card" holders to go to Edinburgh/Glasgow by train very cheaply, not clear if it applies in Dundee though.

Whilst traveling by bus a companion traveling with you who does not qualify for a pass may only have to pay £5 for any journey in Scotland.
http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/regional/buses/concessionary/concessionmarketingcoms/
nationalbuspasstoolkit/listoftcas?page=1#a1000

Thought 6

You might want to have access to email after retiral and to set up a provision at home.

There is an option for you to retain your university email address if you so wish. There are details on the university website http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/staff/ppd/Retirement/Retiredstaff/http:
//www.st-andrews.ac.uk/staff/ppd/Retirement/Retiredstaff/

Thought 7

The power of attorney is something more relevant now than ever before should something happen to you or your partner then having put this in place will save a lot of problems later, so something else to give some thought too.

A further useful link from, the Trades Union movement, can be found at: TUC Work Smart

This information is meant to be helpful and not misleading, but if you find issues or statements that are incorrect, please advise and they will either be removed or amended, but as I said in the very first paragraph, anything included here is based on personal experience and must not be taken as any form of expert legal opinion or financial advice. Further contributions/information to this page would be most welcome. I have included links to other website's but there may also be more that can be added, please let me know. Email bb7@st-and.ac.uk

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