Many thousands of pensioners ripped off

[GastonJ]

Sorry, but it is the government that "force" people to buy anuities and has been for a very long time, but recently fiddle with to allow some not to:

Until now, retirees have been forced to use their pot to buy an annuity ***8211; the insurance product that turns pension savings into a regular income stream ***8211; by the age of 77.
This will change when new rules laid out today come into play next April.
Millions of retired people will then be able to keep their nest eggs invested and draw on them as they choose.
It will also be easier for elderly people to leave their unused life savings to loved ones. In the past, anything left over was swallowed up by an insurance company when a pensioner died.
However, the Government is insisting that pensioners have an income of at least ?20,000 a year before allowing them to opt out of annuities altogether.
Critics say this 'minimum income requirement' means the law change will benefit only the wealthy.

Pensioners no longer forced to buy annuities | This is Money

A Government advisor said many people would have to live until they are 90 before their annuity becomes good value, and that the policies were so dangerous they should carry a risk warning.

She knows it's the government who forces pensioners to buy them and get sh*t value.

[rds60h]

Nobody has mentioned the root cause of the problem !!!
That occurred on 6th April 1986 at the behest of our wonderful friend Maggie Thatcher in the guise of the 1986 Finance Act that made companies drastically reduce Pension Fund Surpluses, which allowed the companies to legally rob and plunder the pension funds for "A refund of surplus to the employer should be available under the legislation where the
Trustees consider it desirable or necessary, for example to avert a cash flow crisis or to aid expansion, but there should not be tax incentives for overfunding" and those pension funds with high surpluses were taxed at 40%. So in fact many companies were actually forced to rob the funds for their own benefit or pay huge taxes to the government.
A certain Robert Maxwell took this opportunity a few steps further than most !!

[bobwill]

Nobody has mentioned the root cause of the problem !!!
That occurred on 6th April 1986 at the behest of our wonderful friend Maggie Thatcher in the guise of the 1986 Finance Act that made companies drastically reduce Pension Fund Surpluses, which allowed the companies to legally rob and plunder the pension funds for "A refund of surplus to the employer should be available under the legislation where the
Trustees consider it desirable or necessary, for example to avert a cash flow crisis or to aid expansion, but there should not be tax incentives for overfunding" and those pension funds with high surpluses were taxed at 40%. So in fact many companies were actually forced to rob the funds for their own benefit or pay huge taxes to the government.
A certain Robert Maxwell took this opportunity a few steps further than most !!

That is all about company pensions which company bosses where allowed to rip off employees pensions,
it has nothing to do with private pensions which have slowly been ripped off in the last few years
Robert Maxwell the bouncing cheque was he tossed off or did he jump?

[rds60h]

That is all about company pensions which company bosses where allowed to rip off employees pensions,
it has nothing to do with private pensions which have slowly been ripped off in the last few years
Robert Maxwell the bouncing cheque was he tossed off or did he jump?

It was this act that speeded the up take of private pensions and government advisors also encouraged people to leave final salary pensions and set up private pension funds.
Also the fact that the plundering of the company pension funds was a large factor in those funds being unlikely to produce enough to meet the needs required and so making private pension appear attractive.
A similar coup was also achieved in the sabotage of With Profits Insurance Policies which had always been the safest Insurance investment other than pensions, because a small guaranteed sum was set at the start and then annual bonuses were attached each year that couldn't be taken away and then the Final Bonus on maturity bumped up the investment, and then made Unit Fund Policies appear the best because of the large payouts that were being made in the boom years. Unfortunately the man paying in each week is the one who has to take the long term risk, because if the Unit Fund collapses the day before pay out is due then he loses everything and of course the Insurance Company loses nothing.