Monthly Archives: March 2015
The Auto-Enrolment Squeeze (and how to get through it)
You know that feeling when you get to the back of a motorway queue and you see traffic extending into the distance.? If you’re lucky you can see the problem ahead from the blue police lights and as you edge … Continue reading
Posted in auto-enrolment, Payroll, pension playpen, pensions
Tagged accident, auto enrolment, car crash, payroll bureau, payroll software, pension, software, staging
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Top 6 blunders of Scheme Actuaries – guest blog from Hilary Salt
The rarefied world of pension scheme actuaries often seems strangely disconnected from that inhabited by other professionals. But I’ve been struck recently by the overlap between criticisms made of other professionals and some of my own concerns about the actuarial … Continue reading
A rosy outlook for employers and workplace pensions
Five years ago, one of the major concerns for the Johnson Committee that Steve Webb set up to consider auto-enrolment was whether there would be choice by the next election. At the meeting, attended by all the workplace pension providers, it … Continue reading
Posted in pensions
Tagged advice, auto enrolment, commissions, MIddleware, money marketing, NEST, Payroll, payroll software
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By George – it’s a right mess! (guest blog by Ralph Frank)
Last week’s Budget further undermined the UK’s system of encouraging private provision towards financial security after the age of 55. Changes in relation to the Lifetime Allowance (“LA”) and consultation on the freedom to sell annuities are the latest contributors to … Continue reading
Posted in pensions
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Magic beans and “negative capability”
Negative capability describes the capacity of human beings to transcend and revise their contexts. If we dismiss it as “magic beans” we are committed to repeating the mistakes of the past – and- as we all know – that way is madness. Continue reading
Posted in Change, corporate governance, drawdown, Financial Education, happiness, Pension Freedoms
Tagged Business, CDC, corporate governance, David Pitt-Watson, dc pensions, Financial services, Government, Hari Mann, John Ralfe, Kevin Wesbroom, madness, magic beans, mistakes, Negative capability, pension, Pension new, pension playpen, pensions, progress, repeating mistakes, Retirement, Steve Webb
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We need a tank to get us across this battlefield!
We must dispel myths we have created and allow to malinger to the detriment of CDC and our pension system. Continue reading
Posted in pensions
Tagged Ann Begg, Business, Business and Economy, CDC, corporate governance, Dame Ann Begg, Defined benefit pension plan, DWP, Employment, Financial services, Government, National Employment Savings Trust, pension, pensions, Politics, public sector, Public Sector Pensions, Retirement, Select Committee, Steve Webb, tanks, ww1
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The Treasury – the office of pension irresponsibility
The Treasury should be renamed the office of pension irresponsibility. It wants to milk pensions as the “new banks” and is acting as the political wing of the housing market. It talks fiscal prudence while pushing the bribes of March. For … Continue reading
Posted in pensions
Tagged Andrew Neil, Budget 2015, First Time Buyers, Housing, housing market, ISA, Lifetime allowance, LTA, Osborne, pensions, Steve Webb, The Treasury
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FINANCIAL UNDERSTANDING – what one insurer’s doing to improve things.
A lot of people think that big financial institutions prey upon the ignorance of the public. Many have, many have treated their customers as seals to be clubbed on the beach. Part of the problem for insurers was that they … Continue reading
Budget heaven – Budget hell?
Those familiar with Saturday kitchen will know that one person’s food heaven is another’s food hell. Whatever George Osborne says on pensions this afternoon is bound to polarise pension people’s views. So here’s the Pension Plowman’s guide to the predictable … Continue reading
Posted in pensions
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