Pensions - Articles - Just Retirement comments on ABI pension withdrawal figures

 “For the minority who took more than 10% of their pension fund as cash withdrawals it is likely to be fairly obvious they can’t do that for very long before the fund runs out. But what about the one in eight people who took between 2% and 4% in the quarter which sounds reasonable but is also unlikely to be sustainable over anything but the short term?”

 “The current data gathered by government does not enable policymakers to understand how many people are following a plan or have other sources of income compared to the numbers not really thinking about or understanding the longer term consequences. That means we just don’t know how many are being prudent or otherwise and probably won’t know for years to come. Government could collect data to populate an early warning system to assess at a macro level whether the taxpayer is being exposed to future risks.”

 “We can see from these figures that not only has drawdown become more popular but annuities still account for a sizeable chunk of retirement income sales and we would expect that to continue. Our hope is that people are discovering how to combine the two in a modern retirement portfolio that uses guaranteed income for life as the solid foundation on which retirees build a more flexible overall strategy. ”