Pension deficit.

[keo]

With the recent and future EVR's etc, am I wrong in thinking that this is just another way that Royal Mail is adding to the pension deficit!
The reasoning behind this thought is that I believe that we are infact paying ourselves off and saving Royal Mail a fortune in redundancy payments as we are using our own pension lump sums and pension pot to help reduce the manpower cost in the slash and burn policy that has taken grip at the moment.
Furthermore to this policy, as we are increasing the monies leaving the pension fund we are reducing the monies going in as there are less and less people paying in because of a number of aspects like reduced manpower, more LTFT contracts and short term contracts where new starts won't be encouraged to join.
( If I was to be offered joining the pension scheme now I wouldn't! )

[RobertT]

( If I was to be offered joining the pension scheme now I wouldn't! )

You could come out of it if you want!

The RM scheme is still much better than a personal/stakeholder pension and having any pension is better than not having one at all,unless you potentially want to work into your 70's and then survive on a bare minimum!

Under current rules no company has to pay anything into their employees pension,RM contribute vast amounts of money into ours. By not taking up an option to join a pension scheme where the employer contributes you are saying no to free money. Just because you don't get it in your weekly wage,doesn't mean it's not worth having!

[BELIAL]

With the recent and future EVR's etc, am I wrong in thinking that this is just another way that Royal Mail is adding to the pension deficit!
The reasoning behind this thought is that I believe that we are infact paying ourselves off and saving Royal Mail a fortune in redundancy payments as we are using our own pension lump sums and pension pot to help reduce the manpower cost in the slash and burn policy that has taken grip at the moment.
Furthermore to this policy, as we are increasing the monies leaving the pension fund we are reducing the monies going in as there are less and less people paying in because of a number of aspects like reduced manpower, more LTFT contracts and short term contracts where new starts won't be encouraged to join.
( If I was to be offered joining the pension scheme now I wouldn't! )

Yep you are dead right.take the money and run and campaign for tax relief on that bit.
Who in their right minds would entrust their life savings to any company/government run pension scheme ,or any similar investment product or financial industry savings scheme ,when after forty years or at the last second before maturity the administrators can change the rules of your contract and reduce your lifelong savings to 0. You would have to be very naive or a complete dimwit,there's lots of examples out there

[RobertT]

Yep you are dead right.take the money and run and campaign for tax relief on that bit.

Your never going to get tax relief on money that's not going into a pension,as that's what tax relief is for.

Who in their right minds would entrust their life savings to any company/government run pension scheme ,or any similar investment product or financial industry savings scheme

Personally I don't trust anyone with all my money so I distribute it amongst several institutions and different asset classes.If your not going to put your life savings into a financial industry savings scheme where are you going to put it,under the mattress?

after forty years or at the last second before maturity the administrators can change the rules of your contract and reduce your lifelong savings to 0.

They can't reduce pension benefits that you've already built up. If the rules change for the future then I'm afraid that's a fact of life and the law. Company pensions are a perk not a right.

You would have to be very naive or a complete dimwit,there's lots of examples out there

Yes there are plenty of examples of companies that have gone to the wall,my RM AVC used to be with Equitable Life until I transferred out and took a hit in the process,but long term I think I've actually benefitted from that. A pension is a long term investment and on average a downturn in stock markets like we've seen recently,happens every 7 years and constitutes a good buying opportunity.