Johan Kriek

I’m a fan of Johan Kriek , so much so that we’re getting him out of bed for our 10.30am 24th November Pension PlayPen Coffee Hour.

But for now we have his thoughts on how people can proceed if they’ve still got pots to convert to pensions at retirement. For people who have their pension being paid by their employer as a  defined benefit pension, for those whose pension with be a collective (CDC) pension, for those at their state pension age there not much to do at retirement.

You just need to tell the people who manage these pensions you’d like to start getting paid and telling them where to pay the money. It’s the time to make sure the scheme knows who’ll be getting a “spouses pension” especially if your spouse has changed. It’s time, whatever your pension to decide whether you want to take the tax free cash on offer from all pensions except the state pension.

But otherwise you should be pretty sure what’s coming your way.  You don’t need an advisor as you can DIY

Johan isn’t talking about those who’ve got a pension coming their way.  Johan’s talking about those who think of guided retirement as an ongoing relationship with someone managing their lifetime income. 

I think he has an answer for another significant group of older people who are relying on a financial adviser to make sure they have capital and cashflow as they need it in their  later years.

Here I see the role of a financial adviser as a pension manager. It has worried me that we are building pensions based on product not on need and there are people who take advice , employ an adviser year after year but who don’t consider their adviser their pension manager.

If I was an adviser and I saw guided retirement coming for my client, I’d look at Johan’s suggestion of “FLEX maybe FIX”. Advisers can manage your pots in one place, help consolidate many pots to pay one pension. Advisers have the tools to monitor how pensions progress and where pensioners are prepared to pay the adviser a known amount of pension for the service, I see this as an alternative for those who won’t do it themselves or depend on providers who don’t know them.

Advisers have been cut out of the conversation lately and that’s wrong. I hope that FLEX maybe FIX is the bridge between freedom and pension for adviser and client.