Chiclanagir

You also need to consider inflation in five years that lump sum may be more but it may be worth less. Plus who knows what will happen in five years. Supposed to be the end of the world today which means none of us will receive any pension.

Chiclanagir

I took my company pension early and glad I did as my company went bust a couple of years later.

Lynn R

I've just checked the LGPS website, and if you joined the scheme before 1 April 1998, you could retire and receive your pension at age 60 provided you would have been able to accrue 25 years' service had you stayed in employment until age 60.

Knew it was something like that as I used to work for a trade union representing public sector staff and remember the controversy about the change being introduced. It was around the same time as the old separate 'Blue Book' and 'Purple Book' conditions of service for LG manual workers and APT&C staff were scrapped and everyone went on to the same conditions.

Mitzyboy

Oh .... not again

jackytoo

I have met a few early retirees in Spain such as ex-Firemen, Policemen etc who finished at 55 with decent pensions, how do they do that?

scampicat

Because police and firemen are allowed by the terms of their pension schemes to retire with full pensions after (I think) 25 year's service.

Fred James

Because that's the deal they are on!

I have a friend who joined the police as a cadet at 16. He retired at 46 having done the required 30 years service on a full pension. He was immediately re-employed in his old job as a civilian - he was the local crime prevention officer.

He did another 12 years in the job and got another pension on top!

No wonder so many people are complaining about public sector pensions!

HBG

The same applies to the armed forces.

I think if you were waiting to be rescued from the roof of a burning house you would not want to see a 64-year old firemen making his unsteady way up the ladder. And if you've just been mugged, would you expect a 64-year old police officer to be running after the mugger?

And can you imagine a 64-year old Air force pilot racing across the skies with a Mig up his arse?

Chiclanagir

A Police Officer can retire after 30 years of service at age 55 on a full pension. Many of them then go to work as a civilian for the same Police authority earning a second pension. Why cannot they just work on the "streets" until 55 and then move to a desk job until 65 plus like everyone else.

scampicat

What difference does it make what they do??

HBG

Those public service jobs that require a high degree of fitness to perform them, like fire officers, police officers, and soldiers, have a limited life span. We are all at our fittest between the ages of 25 and 35, and after 45 it's all downhill.

It's the same with footballers and boxers, they're on the scrapheap long before reaching 50 and make pension provisions accordingly.

Beckham won't be playing for England when he's 45, though he might be managing them.

megmet

I actually stopped work at 56 after an operation went wrong!
I should have been retired on ill health grounds and I should have received my full pension without deductions.
What actually happened was the LG medical examiner refused to accept the written evidence from my surgeon that I could no longer work.
Therefore I would have lost a great deal of MY money had I taken the pension at that point in time.

My financial advisor worked the break even point based on the persentages I would lose, he said that my best time to take it was at my official government retirement age of 60, that's what I did and had a 23% reduction of my lump sum payment and have lost 23% of my LG pension for the rest of my life....now all I have to do is live a very long time to get some of my money back!

What really p***es me off is the fact that I had transferred a large amount from a previous private pension into the fund, for which I paid the usual high charges, if I hadn't done that I could have had a full pension at age 50 without any loss.

Arco-Iris

I don't understand why people get into such a froth about public service pensions. After all, employees are required to pay into a superannuation scheme, i.e. a percentage of their salaries, and if they work for the required number of years, that money is tied up earning interest until they retire.

Most public employees do not enjoy the same level of remuneration and benefits as their privately-employed counterparts doing similar jobs.
So why the groundswell of negative feelings.....if I'm being naive here, perhaps someone can explain.

Fred James

Possibly because there are very many people who have not had the benefit of a company pension scheme or made their own arrangements to provide for their retirement.

When they see what some people receive as pensions they feel aggrieved that they don't get anything apart from the State pension. Of course the fact that they could have done something about it if they could be bothered is usually lost on them.

I used the policeman example just to show just how much some people can get. I don't have a problem with that personally. I had a contributory scheme for many years and when I left the company I took my pot with me and continued to invest in it. I retired at 50 and have been drawing a pension ever since.

whitelinen

Hmmmmm, what about the many hundreds of thousands of people (including myself) in the private sector who were bothered and did do something only to have it stolen by the institutions and banks.