What is pension drawdown?

It is the option you have at retirement to take money from your pension pots as and when you want. You can start to do this anytime once you are 55.

Apart from using Guiide what other options do I have if I want to drawdown my pension funds?

Pay for financial advice or work out a plan for yourself. There are sites that provide further helpful guidance such as the Money Advice Service that can guide you further and advisers at the end of our journey can help you if you need advice.

How much does financial advice cost?

It depends on many things, but for full independent whole of market financial advice, somewhere between £2,000 to £3,500 for at retirement advice on setting up a suitable drawdown plan including the investment and tax advice needed for this. There may also be additional costs for any pre retirement planning and annual reviews of your plan.

What exactly does Guiide do again?

It's aim is to improve retirement outcomes. In simple terms, if you want to drawdown your pension, it shows you how much you need to pay in before you retire, and how much to take from your pension and savings pots each month when you retire, to get what you want tax efficiently and avoid running out of money. It also shows you how much you can save in tax and in charges over the course of your plan, meaning more of your money can go towards your retirement income.

Why is there a need for Guiide?

A large proportion of people want to take their pension pots flexibly at retirement. Whilst we recommend taking independent whole of market advice, a large proportion of people who do take their pots flexibly do not take this and "do it themselves". The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has recently stated this is unlikely to lead to the best outcome for these people and leads to many risks. Guiide helps those who want to do it themselves. Again the FCA and the Association of British Insurers (ABI) have both stated there is a need for innovation to help people who choose to do this.

Who built Guiide?

Guiide was built by a pensions actuary and programmers with many years of combined experience of advising individuals, companies and trustees on pensions and providing tools and communications to members of schemes in a way in which they can understand them.

What is an actuary?

You can see what actuaries do by visiting www.actuaries.org.uk. In short, pensions actuaries know how to do all the boring maths work to make sure pensions can be paid, so you don't have to and can spend time doing something more interesting.

How much does Guiide cost?

Nothing, it's free forever as it says on the homepage, you will never pay anything to use Guiide.

Are there any other completely free sites that do what Guiide does?

We don't believe there are currently any other free sites or tools which do exactly what Guiide does. We think there is a need for it and that's why we built it.

Is my data safe?

Firstly we do not require or ask for any details of your pension or savings accounts, even the names of the providers or schemes whom they are with. All we need are the amounts and some details about you, such as your date of birth and when you want to retire. Any data provided is fully encrypted with leading encryption software. Please read our privacy policy for further details.

I read somewhere you should take no more than 4% of your fund each year to avoid running out of money?

This makes no sense if you think about it. A good drawdown plan will give you what you want each year, taking account of everything else you have, in calculating how much you should take. Nearly everyone will have a state pension for example and many others have incomes or savings they can use in retirement, so the amount you need usually changes year to year depending on what else you have and exactly what you want.

What other options do I have with my pension pots, other than drawdown?

Buy a guaranteed income for life or a fixed term, called an annuity, or take it all as a lump sum (which isn't a good idea for most people).

What about tax?

You tell Guiide what you want after tax, so it estimates the tax you pay to work out what your after tax income will be. Guiide also shows you how to take your income in a tax efficient way so you save money on expected tax.

What if I can't even get the minimum I need?

Guiide shows you how much more you need to pay to get this, if you can afford to pay more, or gives you other options to consider if you can't.

I don’t want to use all my pension pots in retirement, I'd like to pass some on?

Guiide lets you set an amount to one side that you don’t want to touch and aim to pass on.

Can I just use my Guiide plan with my own pension and savings providers?

Yes of course you can.

I have total pension pots close to £1,000,000 and may have lifetime allowance tax issues

Good for you. We would recommend you seek an independent financial adviser and discuss these tax issues with them. Guiide will not be able to help you with any complex tax issues you may have like this, but for most people this will not be an issue.

I have a final salary based pension from my old employer?

Guiide can include the income from one or more of these in your plan. Just put the details in Guiide and it will build your drawdown plan around the income from these and everything else you have.

Can I transfer this final salary pension to a pension pot?

It is possible that you can, but Guiide can't help you with this, you will need to speak to a financial adviser who specialises in providing advice on these types of transfers as you cannot do it without advice. Any adviser shown on our journey can help with this.

Can I put my husband/wife/partner's retirement pots and income in the same plan?

At the moment you can only do one plan at a time, just split the total amount you want between the both of you and let Guiide build a separate plan for each of you. We aim to add a joint feature at some point in future.

Can I use various different growth assumptions for many different pension and savings investments?

Guiide is designed to be a simple tool for individuals who know little about pensions and investments to use themselves. It allows you to use one assumption for your pension pots overall and one for your savings pots overall. It assumes you will put the pension pots and savings pots in one simple ready made portfolio for each of these rather than choose a range of funds or individual investments. If you want to choose a range of funds or pick individual investments, again we would recommend you seek independent financial advice on this unless you have a lot of experience of managing your own investments.

Is Guiide FCA regulated?

Guiide is not FCA regulated or authorised by the FCA to provide advice, as it does not provide advice. It only provides guidance and calculations to help you build a plan. We have had lots of discussions with FCA innovate when building Guiide. They have confirmed that Guiide does not do anything that requires FCA regulation for anyone that wishes to use their plan with their own provider.

Does Guiide get paid by the advisers on the site if I get advice from them?

Yes, to be completely clear Guiide is paid a one off referral payment by any adviser you chose to take advice from. You do not pay any more than if you found them directly. This allows us to provide Guiide for free.