What We Discuss

In order to give advice on a defined benefit pension review we need to know what your goals and objectives are. We need to determine in detail what you are trying to achieve and why you are reviewing your pension now. We will ask you details like whether you need any guarantees from your pension and what you want to happen to your retirement benefits when you die. If you are looking for a ‘flexible’ outcome we will explore what you are trying to achieve with you.

To advise on your pension plans we also need details of your wider financial circumstances as we consider all of your assets and liabilities when we provide pension advice. If your finances / expenses are linked to another person, we will also need details of their financial circumstances.

We will discuss your existing income and expenditure and we will also look to the time when you plan to retire and estimate your future income (from all sources) and your anticipated expenditure.

To plan this, it is useful if you could review your recent expenditure. This way you will be prepared for our meeting.

We will consider income and expenditure for the household so you may need to gather information from anyone who you share your financial commitments with.

Beyond the financial considerations and calculations, we will also discuss what is really important to you when you retire, and we will also consider things that would be nice to have. We will then prioritise these with you and see if we can help you to achieve your aims.

We can never be sure what the future holds but we will also discuss how you envisage things may develop and change in the coming years.

This could involve how you aim to retire such as winding down over a number of years, or targeting a specific date when you will fully retire.

Whether you may receive a lump sum in the future such as selling your property and moving into a smaller house, or whether you expect to receive an inheritance.

We ask you to give some thought to how you feel your expenditure may change in retirement such as whether you expect your spending to increase or decrease as you get older.

When you move from a defined benefit pension into a defined contribution pension, there is a change in the different risks associated with each pension. We will discuss investment risk and pension transfer risk with you.

Your state of health is very important to our advice, we will discuss this with you to assess if there are any conditions which could mean you have a reduced life expectancy, or whether you may be in a position where you are unable to continue to work.