Financial Services > Pensions > Stakeholder Pensions > Stakeholder Pensions for Employees
If you work for a company that has five or more employees, then the company has a legal obligation - if they do not offer an existing pension to their workers - to provide you with access to a stakeholder pension. Some employers will also throw in their own contribution to the scheme on top of any contributions you make yourself. Usually, these are called 'employer-sponsored' schemes. The employer is effectively offering you free money here, so it might well be worth taking advantage of, even if you have pension provision elsewhere.
If you do take up a stakeholder pension scheme at work, your employer is legally obliged to supply you with an annual statement of all contributions and the pension's current value, as well as supply a forecast of what potentially the pension could be worth when you retire. Useful (and probably sobering) information.
Joining a stakeholder pension firm does not disqualify you from the national pension entitlement - it is designed simply to supplement it. The older you are, the more important it is to keep up your contributions, and to pay in as much as you can afford. Don't forget that employers, where legally obliged, must offer their staff access to a stakeholder scheme - and they can be fined up to £50,000 if they don't.
So far, employees nationwide have been slow to take up the advantages of employer stakeholder pension plans, despite effort to promote these schemes.
For many other alternative ways to build up a fund for retirement, visit us at www.Investments.co.uk
Pensions.co.uk is part of a large network of financial sites created to help advise you on life events, such as buying a house, Mortgages.co.uk; insuring your car - CarInsurances.co.uk; your life - LifeInsurance.co.uk; and your home - HomeInsurance.co.uk.
1998 - 2007 UK Pensions - Planning before, at the onset and during retirement.
| pensions news |
|---|
| Company pensions 'vital for retirement' - Tue, 26 Aug 2008 |
| Pensions fraud faces crackdown - Fri, 22 Aug 2008 |
| Low-paid workers 'may not benefit from personal accounts' - Thu, 21 Aug 2008 |
| More News |