Be alert to the dangers of pension scams. Always check the companies you’re talking to are specifically authorised to deal with pensions and are listed on the FCA register.
Request a retirement pack from the DB Section administrator, Trafalgar House. If you’re retiring at your normal retirement age, they’ll usually send you one automatically six months before this with a personal statement of your benefits.
Get some financial advice if you need more support.
Decide how you’re going to take your pension.
See ‘Your retirement choices’ below.
Fill in the relevant forms and send them to the DB Section administrator, Trafalgar House, for them to process your retirement choice.
Start enjoying your retirement.
You have some choices to make about how you’d like to take your pension from the DB Section. Your options include:
This is paid to you every month for the rest of your life.
You can choose to exchange some of your Scheme pension (up to 25%, capped at £268,275) for a tax-free cash lump sum. Your reduced pension is paid to you every month for the rest of your life. Find out more about this in our Taking a lump sum guide.
Sometimes called a bridging pension, this is a way of smoothing out your total income in retirement between retiring from the Scheme and getting your State pension. You receive a higher Scheme pension in the years leading up to your State pension age and a lower Scheme pension afterwards. Find out more about this in the Stepped pension guide.
If you paid additional voluntary contributions (AVCs), you might decide to include them as part of your tax-free cash lump sum to boost your Scheme benefits. Alternatively, you can take them separately from your Scheme pension by transferring them to another pension provider. Please note that only 25% will be tax free with the balance being taxed at your marginal rate.
If you want to manage your retirement income more flexibly, you can take a cash equivalent transfer value (CETV) and transfer the value of all your benefits in the DB Section to a defined contribution arrangement with an alternative provider.
The DB Section provides valuable benefits for you and your family. A transfer is an irreversible decision, so please think carefully before proceeding. If you transfer out of the DB Section, you’d no longer be a member of the Scheme and any benefits that may have been payable on your death would no longer be available.
If the value of your benefits is over £30,000, you’ll need to take independent financial advice before any transfer can go ahead.
To find out more about how market conditions can affect your transfer value, please see our Transfer values guide.
