I understand that after some changes in the finance laws in the UK it is now supposedly possible to get a hold of private pensions when you are 55. I have a modest pot with Abbey Life and am interested in hearing from anyone that has managed to get their paws on the pot, or what I understand is the 25% Tax free amount.

My pension is in two parts, it is made up from the contributions paid from wages and I believe a smaller pot from opting out of something or other that the government used to run.

 

Has anyone gone through the steps to get a hold of the tax free amount? Is it as simple process from here, are there any nasties regarding UK tax laws that need to be avoided etc. Bit of a pain trying to deal with Abbey from here too, they will not respond to e mails, they only use snail mail to my mothers address in the UK (where I am allegedly living)

 

Any advice is greatly appreciated - I am not interested in these rip off companies that want the pension transferred to them for a fee, I would like to do it on my own but I heard somewhere that you need to go through some sort of independent financial advisor to be able to get at it and then put the balance after the tax free lump on some sort of drawdown. As you can probably tell by this post I have absolutely no idea about how all of this works as I haven't lived over in the UK for getting on 20 years so it is extremely blurred as far as I am concerned.

 

Any info will as always be a great help!

 

Cheers.

14 minutes ago, Formaleins said:

Has anyone gone through the steps to get a hold of the tax free amount? Is it as simple process from here, are there any nasties regarding UK tax laws that need to be avoided etc.

My private pensions were only available at UK gov pension time that's the way it had to stay.

Anyway " tax free amount? " are exactly what they are, I had a choice at the time so took large enough tax free sums so what was left as pension amounts plus UK gov pension I was not much over the earnings tax threshold so paid only small amounts of tax on total pension income.  

3 minutes ago, Kwasaki said:

My private pensions were only available at UK gov pension time that's the way it had to stay.

Anyway " tax free amount? " are exactly what they are, I had a choice at the time so took large enough tax free sums so what was left as pension amounts plus UK gov pension I was not much over the earnings tax threshold so paid only small amounts of tax on total pension income.  

Thanks, I want to keep my involvement with UK tax department to a minimum, as I say I have not been over there for 20 years, but I think I am still registered for UK tax, the last thing I want is to get invited to the tax office to explain 20 years of not filing a tax report. All I want is to get a hold of the tax free portion for the time being and the remainder can stay where it is for a few years. It is the path of least resistance that I am trying to follow.

I have just completed this process from China. Feel free to PM me.

9 minutes ago, Formaleins said:

I would like to do it on my own but I heard somewhere that you need to go through some sort of independent financial advisor to be able to get at it and then put the balance after the tax free lump on some sort of drawdown.

 

I'm an expat in Thailand for almost 7 years and have just returned from a 2 week trip back to the UK where one of my financial tasks was to consolidate 5 separate pension pots into one transparent SIPP for the purposes of more transparent investment and possibly beginning drawdown in the next few years. I am 57 years old. The platform I chose was AJ Bell and they are currently in the process of doing it all for me. 2 of the 5 have now been transferred, the others are still a work in progress for AJ Bell, expected completion over the next few weeks. There are other platforms too. See here: - https://www.boringmoney.co.uk/best-buys/

 

My advice would be to read, read, read and educate yourself on the subject before committing to anything. I'm not being patronising, but this is a once in a lifetime event which can impact your future financial situation. I personally spent months reading up on this subject prior to committal and I'm only soon to be completing step one.

 

A similar question to yours was posed on This Is Money:

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/pensions/article-6578177/Can-25-lump-sum-leave-rest-pension-is.html

 

 

You say you have a policy with Abbey. I have had dealing with them before all done by Email never a problem, as they will reply with same. No matter where in the world you are. If your policy allows you to get the 25% tax free at 55 you should be able to get same. You just have to find the correct Email address and person that deals with same. Any monies you should get will be paid into your bank. Even if it's a Thai one.

 

Best of luck

4 minutes ago, Traubert said:

I have just completed this process from China. Feel free to PM me.

Thanks!

1 minute ago, roger buttmore said:

 

I'm an expat in Thailand for almost 7 years and have just returned from a 2 week trip back to the UK where one of my financial tasks was to consolidate 5 separate pension pots into one transparent SIPP for the purposes of more transparent investment and possibly beginning drawdown in the next few years. I am 57 years old. The platform I chose was AJ Bell and they are currently in the process of doing it all for me. 2 of the 5 have now been transferred, the others are still a work in progress for AJ Bell, expected completion over the next few weeks. There are other platforms too. See here: - https://www.boringmoney.co.uk/best-buys/

 

My advice would be to read, read, read and educate yourself on the subject before committing to anything. I'm not being patronising, but this is a once in a lifetime event which can impact your future financial situation. I personally spent months reading up on this subject prior to committal and I'm only soon to be completing step one.

 

A similar question to yours was posed on This Is Money:

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/pensions/article-6578177/Can-25-lump-sum-leave-rest-pension-is.html

 

 

Many thanks, not patronising at all, excellent advice!

Sent you a PM with some information. 

I took the lazy approach and transferred my 2 UK pensions to a QROPS (when there was no UK tax to pay).  They arranged it all, including paying me a 30% Tax free lump sum.

In retrospect I'd have been much better off consolidating them into a SIPP and just taking the 25% limit.

Perhaps it's fortunate that QROPS are no longer worthwhile due to the UK tax that now needs to be paid up front.

 

The earlier post re. AJ Bell is something that the OP might be worth following up.

26 minutes ago, Piet390 said:

Sent you a PM with some information. 

Thanks but haven't received any message from you.

45 minutes ago, steve73 said:

I took the lazy approach and transferred my 2 UK pensions to a QROPS (when there was no UK tax to pay).  They arranged it all, including paying me a 30% Tax free lump sum.

In retrospect I'd have been much better off consolidating them into a SIPP and just taking the 25% limit.

Perhaps it's fortunate that QROPS are no longer worthwhile due to the UK tax that now needs to be paid up front.

 

The earlier post re. AJ Bell is something that the OP might be worth following up.

I started the QROPS process but changed to a SIPP down the the line. Moved the whole thing offshore.

5 hours ago, Formaleins said:

Thanks, I want to keep my involvement with UK tax department to a minimum, as I say I have not been over there for 20 years, but I think I am still registered for UK tax, the last thing I want is to get invited to the tax office to explain 20 years of not filing a tax report. All I want is to get a hold of the tax free portion for the time being and the remainder can stay where it is for a few years. It is the path of least resistance that I am trying to follow.

When you draw the pension the pension provider has obligations to UK HMRC you can't avoid them they are the UK God, the pension provider taxed me on pensions but not the lump sums, as already said there tax free.

I was taxed on pension payments at first and then HMRC refunded me, if you have not earned money in UK you can't be taxed on it until it reaches a taxable yearly amount.     

17 hours ago, Formaleins said:

Thanks, I want to keep my involvement with UK tax department to a minimum, as I say I have not been over there for 20 years, but I think I am still registered for UK tax, the last thing I want is to get invited to the tax office to explain 20 years of not filing a tax report. All I want is to get a hold of the tax free portion for the time being and the remainder can stay where it is for a few years. It is the path of least resistance that I am trying to follow.

 

You should be able to deal with Abbey Life directly via email as another poster stated as regards getting a lump sum, tax free, deposited in your UK bank. Then get a monthly draw when you want to. Mine was all done with Railway Pensions which is a bit easier admittedly, but the process is the same. I had the lump sum when I retired at 60 and a higher monthly payment which then drops at 66 as I will be getting State Pension as well.

As a final word, make sure you are not losing out by taking your 25% at 55 as this can affect the whole pot. Check the financial implications of taking at 55 or 60. And another thought is if you have Skype then pay a modest subscription so you can actually phone them at no extra cost.  

Tax: If you had insufficient earnings (below the personal allowance) and no tax due - or if you had and tax was deducted at source (PAYE) there is no obligation to complete an annual tax return ,so you have no issues with HMRC.

You can indeed take 25% of your pot tax free after 55. If you don’t need the cash you can leave it invested and growing and of course the 25% then becomes a larger sum when you do. If the pension has matured check what GMP (guaranteed minimum pension) rate applies. Older policies had much higher GMPs than you would get on buying an annuity today so you might decide that it would be better to take the whole amount as income for the rest of your life instead of the lump sum. Depends on your own circumstances.

You should be able to cash the full value of the pension pot if that's your wish.

You will pay tax at the appropriate rate after the first 25%.

This is classified in the same way as earned income and the pension company will issue a P45, did you not inform HMRC that you were moving overseas?

The second part of the pension you mentioned is most probably opting out of serps, many pensions did this as it enhanced your personal pension.

I cannot understand why they don't reply to your emails, unless they are being filtered as spam coming from Thailand.

Hope this helps.

I  did it with AXA.

Contacted them and they sent the forms all done and dusted with no drama at all.

My registered address is in Thailand and I have a UK bank account which my other pensions are Paid into so the process was very quick and simple.

Good luck.

Reading up on the subject is good advice!

The legacy policies may, not have the flexibility of the new SIPPS, concentrating them could be good, depending on the policy details & values. 

I went for moving legacy policies to SIPPs moving the majority of funds to draw down when 55, whilst taking 25% TFLS of that amount. If you don't need the 75%, it can sit there growing tax free, in trust, and double up as an insurance substitute, out with your estate, for your dependants.

The advantage of the draw down is that though the 75% of it is all taxable, you can tailor what you draw down per tax year from that bit, to suit your other income.

All sorts of configurations, up to you ???? 

There are some restrictions on what you can do if you are not UK Tax resident, good you maintain the UK address, and hopefully a UK bank account (easier).

 

Hi regarding AJ Bell ,do they allow income drawdown direct to a Thai bank account ?

 

 

9 hours ago, Chuchi said:

Hi regarding AJ Bell ,do they allow income drawdown direct to a Thai bank account ?

 

 

I use AJ Bell. Excellent service. Will make payments to any bank account..

On 5/2/2019 at 12:51 PM, steve73 said:

I took the lazy approach and transferred my 2 UK pensions to a QROPS (when there was no UK tax to pay).  They arranged it all, including paying me a 30% Tax free lump sum.

In retrospect I'd have been much better off consolidating them into a SIPP and just taking the 25% limit.

Perhaps it's fortunate that QROPS are no longer worthwhile due to the UK tax that now needs to be paid up front.

 

The earlier post re. AJ Bell is something that the OP might be worth following up.

Why isn't QROPS worthwhile any more?

10 hours ago, stament said:

Why isn't QROPS worthwhile any more?

As I understand it, you now have to pay tax on any sums being QROP'd when you move it.

For me I was ale to QROP the full sum with no tax liability, but there are still quite hefty fees to pay.

I'm not a Financial Advisor, so you'll need to DYOR.. 

12 hours ago, stament said:

Why isn't QROPS worthwhile any more?

Remember you could be left with a substantial tax directly due to HMRC, after the company quite happily does your QROPS.

 

pensionadvisoryservice.org.uk has a QROPS spotlight PDF that gives more generally info. Look at the 25% & 55% Tax figures mentioned there!

 

https://www.pensionsadvisoryservice.org.uk/about-pensions/when-things-change/overseas-transfers

 

https://www.pensionsadvisoryservice.org.uk/content/spotlights-files/uploads/QROPS_SPOT021_v1.3.pdf