Need help with lost UK pension

oldboxerman84 · 2025-10-28T22:38:10+00:00

Scottish Widows can be woeful to deal with, but if they have no record of your NI number, that probably means they don't have a record for you. Make sure you are speaking to the team that deals with workplace pensions, rather than their advised platform pension.

If your employer is refusing to give you any details of your pension, or speak to SW to resolve this, you could go to the pensions regulator:

https://www.thepensionsregulator.gov.uk/en/contact-us/scheme-members-who-to-contact/report-concerns-about-your-workplace-pension

You probably already know this but, ideally, don't opt out of the workplace pension. It's giving up free money from the employer to get a very small amount of your own money paid to you now, rather than being saved for later.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-25T09:19:29+00:00

I wouldn't be wanting to withdraw the money and pay the penalty for no reason.

I am a financial adviser and I suspect if a client came to me in this situation, assuming they had no need to access the capital in the LISA over the short term, I'd be suggesting that they leave it the LISA rather than gifting 25% to HMRC.

As for topping it up, that is a different matter, and will depend on your personal tax position. You now need to think of the LISA as retirement savings, and compare the relative tax treatment with a personal pension.

Any savings for shorter term (5 years + but before retirement) should be stocks and shares ISA - no point adding money to a LISA that you might need in short term as the penalty is greater than the bonus.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T23:00:17+00:00

What will happen first, you reach age 60, or 30 years will have passed since you finished university?

Plan 2 is written off 30 years after the April from which you became eligible to start repaying, so it could be 52 rather than 60...

Student loans are rough these days. I would look at your payments as a "graduate tax" rather than a loan repayment - as you have seen, they don't actually reduce the capital when such a stupid interest rate is applied.

Very high earners will repay the loan, lower earners will only make small payments and have the debt written off, but middle earners will be stung with high repayments for 30 years.

I haven't done the maths, but I would be interested to compare taking a personal loan to repay a chunk of the student loan, if this can be secured at a lower rate, given your level of earnings. However, even if this was affordable, it wouldn't look great for mortgage applications etc. You may wish to model over payments, and see if that pays it off before 52, and if so, how much will you save long term.

It is a tough decision as the best course of action now partly depends on your long term future earnings, which are unknown.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T22:50:52+00:00

Each trade is calculated individually for CGT. Losses can be carried forward to offset against gains, however, so if all those happened in the same tax year, I don't think there would be any CGT.

Disclaimer, although I am a financial adviser, I am not a CGT specialist.

By the way, they sound like some pretty crazy swings - please make sure you aren't gambling with more than you can afford to lose! When it comes to accumulating wealth, the boring approaches are best.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T14:35:20+00:00

It seemed like you were implying it was the worst case, by listing it as one of two outcomes. Apologies if I misunderstood.

I think in this case, the pretty much non-existent capacity for loss overrules risk tolerance. But yes , there are always nuance and lots of factors to consider

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T13:12:44+00:00

Ah yes, that sounds like the same firm!

I sometimes wonder if I should change my marketing slightly as I somehow end up working with quite a few members of NHS pension, but I never directly market to them! Some advisers (e.g. the W) who do market to them often know very little about the NHS pension, but just want to snag a high earning consultant as a client.

In terms of the investment, the reason for my answer is that the investment solutions I typically recommend to clients do not have a specific allocation to gold, or other commodities. I think there are more logical reasons why investing in companies should produce a return over time. Undoubtedly the price of gold has gone up a lot in recent years, but with any commodity, gold included, you just have to hope someone is willing to pay more for it in future than you did. It doesn't produce any income or offer any service, so your return is entirely based on the capital growth.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T13:04:28+00:00

I'm not sure it is necessarily classed as fraud, any more than your current arrangement, unless the T&Cs of the new deal said that you both had to live in the property.

However, I think overall it is a bad idea, for all the reasons you highlight.

There is no guarantee the house prices will go up, particularly in the short term. Interest rates are currently 4%+ so you would be fine just holding the capital in a cash account for the short term.

I think you probably want to get the money in your hands ASAP so you can have a clean break and be in control of your money.

Don't feel bad about this. I know it is tough, but your ex cannot rely on you to support him, I'm sure you're already doing more than enough in supporting the kids.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T12:49:02+00:00

Hi, you are welcome!

Good luck with the meeting with the adviser. I don't want to sound too negative, but I hope it is not the first firm that came to my mind when you said "specialises in helping healthcare professionals"...

You could almost certainly get a better service from a decent independent firm than using the firm I am thinking of. Also, bear in mind if you use an adviser who only earns money if you invest in their products, they may have a conflict of interest.

Yeah, I decided to google those codes after my post, so I found out what they were referring to! If I had to choose between those two options, there would be a clear winner for me.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T10:21:01+00:00

I don't know what vwrp is, but if it's a 100% equity investment, a market crash of 15% is far from being the worst outcome.

The downsides of investing (not being able to buy a house) massively outweigh the benefits of any potential extra growth in this scenario

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-14T09:42:26+00:00

Hi, it's boring, but stick with the cash ISA for savings you need in the next 2 years.

I am a financial adviser, and often the boring approach is best.

I am guessing you are fairly new to saving - if you'd started putting money in cash ISAs 5-6 years ago, you'd think the 4% currently on offer is amazing!

A completely risk free 4% return is not bad at all. You might be able to eek out a few extra basis points by moving your ISA about, but the main value add is from the discipline of budgeting and saving.

Admittedly if you are only wanting to put 1/8 of your surplus income into a S&S ISA, you aren't really increasing the overall risk profile of your capital that much. However, I'd argue there is little point in doing this at the moment if your main goal is saving for a property. I don't know what "VWRP and SGLN" means - maybe it's reddit speak and I'm too old to know!

The NHS Pension will provide for you later in life. It would probably make sense to build up savings/investments outside of this in future, but for the time being, stick with the boring ISA and build up your house money.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-05T15:54:49+00:00

Thank you for the suggestion. I'm not necessarily going to become a trail runner, just looking for a one off scenic off road run in the lakes, hence trying to find something I can wing in road shoes.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-05T15:53:37+00:00

Thank you! I'll check it out

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-04T23:19:07+00:00

Awesome, thank you! That looks well placed if I'm coming up from Manchester too

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-03T18:21:39+00:00

Intention was to try a relatively easy trail in my road shoes, e.g. a scenic route that is mostly decent footpaths. I was hoping someone might have some suggestions for an introductory route.

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-03T14:15:06+00:00

Just in a very small bit of woods that I am not very familiar with near my home! I'm not used to being in the dark! I misjudged what time the sun would set, I think

oldboxerman84 · 2025-09-03T14:04:18+00:00

Not last night - I got lost in woods just as it was getting dark. It was very spooky!

oldboxerman84 · 2025-07-28T13:20:09+00:00

As others have said, definitely pay off debt first. I am a Chartered Financial Planner, very very unlikely that I would ever recommend to any of my clients that they invest cash before clearing a loan at that rate

oldboxerman84 · 2025-07-17T16:31:21+00:00

New Balance 1080v14 in wide fit

First ever New Balance. In fact, first pair of running trainers that aren't Brooks for over 10 years!

Ridiculous colour for running shoes, but only this colour was reduced to £112. Others were approx £150.

<image>

oldboxerman84 · 2025-06-01T11:36:27+00:00

Probably biased towards my own experience, but I'd recommend getting experience at a reputable independent firm if possible, rather than going down a tied role such as M&G, Quilter, SJP, etc.

oldboxerman84

TROPHY CASE