Pension Transfer - Good News Story

[DelianLeague]

Hello All,

It took only 3 weeks to transfer my pension!!

I thought you all might like to here a good news story about my latest Pension Transfer. I think this is my 5th pension transfer to date and hopefully the last.

It was a DC Mastertrust scheme that I transferred from L&G into my SIPP. It took 3 weeks in total and that was without using the Origo fast payment system.

This is in contrast to one of my transfers taking over 6 months (for no apparent reason).

So far I have transferred the following: DC private pension (partial transfer), serps pension pot, AVC part of my DB pension, DC company pension and Mastertrust DC pension.
All a little bit different with their different problems. The fastest was the Mastertrust into my SIPP. The next fastest was the AVC, and the worst was the DC company scheme that took over 6 months. They used an administrator that didn't seem to have any interest or care (or staff).

I hope that anyone also doing this has the same luck as me with my last transfer.

Regards, D.L.

[ouzo]

That's good to hear. I'm just about to transfer my L&G Mastertrust pension to my SIPP and hope it's as quick.

This will be my first (and only) transfer. Do I let L&G know in advance that I'm moving away or does my SIPP provider do it all?

TIA
Ann

[DelianLeague]

This will be my first (and only) transfer. Do I let L&G know in advance that I'm moving away or does my SIPP provider do it all?

In my experience, Receiving SIPP providers are very good during the transfer process but when they sometimes state that "you don't have to do anything apart from filling in the form at their end and then they will take in from there" this is not normally the case.

I started by telephoning L&G and telling them my intention of transferring and what I needed to do from there perspective. There were a couple of things. I don't have the info in front of me at the moment, I think I have stored it away but it was something like: a valuation & a release certificate.

I also cross referenced all documents I sent to my SIPP from L&G with a Ref number ( I used the one that my SIPP generated when I filled out their online generated transfer form).
Also, when telephoning L&G, it is important that you ask them the correct L&G address/contact details for 'transfers' to put on your SIPP transfer form as this is often different than the contact details that is given on your L&G correspondence/statements etc. You need to fill in your SIPP transfer form correct the first time.

Regards, D.L. (good luck)

[ouzo]

Cheers DL, very useful. I'll report back once the transfer has happened.

Ann

[ouzo]

It took L&G just short of six weeks to transfer my pension to AJ Bell. I phoned L&G after four weeks as I'd heard nothing from them (apparently the different departments involved could only see some of my info and were seemingly unable to talk to each other). In fact the only communication eventually received was a text to say that my pension transfer request had been completed! Maybe there'll be something in the post this week.

Now to decide what investments to make ...

Ann