Do you have a lost pension?

Transcript

Unknown Speaker  0:12   Hello, and welcome to Episode 17 of wealth talk. My name is Christian Rodwell, the membership director for wealth builders. And I'm joined by Mr. Kevin Wayland. How you doing, Kevin?

Unknown Speaker  0:21  
I'm doing well today Christian it's the first time we've done the podcast with that was being in the same room together today. It is it is.

Unknown Speaker  0:27  
We're doing it remotely today. But I'm sure the experience will be just as enjoyable as, as usual. And we're moving on to pillar two today, which is pensions. Know, this was an area close to your heart, Kevin,

Unknown Speaker  0:40  
it's an area very close to my heart, but bit ly calm capacity, Chris, when we saw the evidence of people turning their homes into something that they thought outside of the box, and then discovered that there was hidden power in in their bricks and mortar. And that's relatively easy to see, I think. But pensions is dead. The opaque one is the dark one. It's the gray one, it's the people. It's the one that people hit snooze, when they hear the word pension, they think, Oh no, this is a box consigned to when I'm 65, do not disturb Do not touch. You know, this is just something that gets done gets arranged for me. And there's nothing I can do. Right? Yeah, yeah, I think I know, it's the most underutilized it's more underutilized. And then the the assets, which is pillar one, which is property capacity, their pension one is the biggest, most undiscovered asset that people can bring to life, if they choose to. And there's a whole new language around it, Chris, which will, will, of course need to share like everything in wealth building, you have to learn a little bit of new language, because it's that new language, that helps you think outside the tradition of you know, what you've been taught, which is, you know, put your money in the hands of somebody else, let them take care of it. And you pick up some money, when you reach the ripe old age of, you know, 65, or whatever, you know, I read an article, just this weekend, Chris, which said, you know, the number of over 70s, still in work is doubled in the last decade, you know, really well or just having to, to, to support their lives, in their late 60s and early 70s. And sometimes even beyond that. And this isn't to do with fun. This isn't you know, doing some charity work, this isn't giving back to society, this is making sure they can make ends meet, because the combination of what they did in their wealth building just wasn't enough. And the biggest one that's going to cause people massive, massive pain is the pension one. And we should really dive into that one Christian and talk about the different shape of pensions, a different style, just so people get it. We're trying to miss defy it and just make it really, really simple. And I think we've got a few people who are going to give testimony and they too. they've forgotten something, and then we nudge them. And then they found money and sometimes spectacular sums, isn't that right?

Unknown Speaker  3:14  
Well, absolutely. And we'll we'll go into those very shortly. But because this such a big topic, really pensions will probably cover this over at least a couple of episodes, maybe even three of next couple of weeks as well, because there's many different facets on their different different things that can be done with the pensions.

Unknown Speaker  3:31  
Yeah, well, there's so much to do. So why don't why don't we start just by kind of understanding a little bit more about what we actually mean by the word pension, and how they work. And how how they work now is a product of the past is definitely not a product of the future. And then we can introduce the concept of SAS, which some of our listeners will have heard before, enthusiastically been spoken about probably running the way through this series, I think we'll hear that word coming across time and time and time again. So we need to give them that language student because

Unknown Speaker  4:09  
we do. And there's some resources that we can share with this episode today, as well like some videos to go and watch and to start understanding a bit more about the SAS pension. And that's SS as a small self administered scheme. So before we actually start hearing from some of our our guests today, Kevin, is there anything else that you'd like to talk about with regards to pension?

Unknown Speaker  4:30  
Yeah, I think there are two really fundamental types, Chris. And I think it's important that the listeners work out, you know, which of the two that they have, or maybe they've got both, and I'm not going to talk about state pension, because we know that's being kicked back further and further and further and further and further away. And, frankly, wealth builders order to be to

Unknown Speaker  4:56  
shouldn't be too worried about state pension, because if they're worried about that they got the wrong plan. So they shouldn't be in the wealth builders program at all. But in the pension is getting worse and worse and worse, and the government is just not enough money. So talking about not being enough money, the big one that I suppose is now closed, for the vast majority, it used to be the way that I suppose those people were pension served them? Well, Chris came from what we're what we call the final salary pension, sometimes known as a defined benefit pension, sometimes Shawn to dB. So we want to have some language here. So final salary, slash defined benefit, slice dB. And all that means is way back when, you know Industrial Revolution type, then when people used to work for the same company, from age 25, to 65, or 20, to 60. And then they retired, the whole concept of retirement was really you and knackered. You know, you were you needed to give up work because you were just exhausted. And what happened in the I suppose origination of pensions is the idea that the benevolent employer would set up a scheme that the individual employee wouldn't have to worry about, he would just be there ready and waiting for them when they reached their retirement date. So they stepped off work, got the carriage clock, maybe or some gift on the way, and then they got a pension for the rest of their life. And you know, that was a really good plan. And it served thousands and thousands and thousands of people in the UK. But those days are long gone. And we definitely touch on that Christian the book, Seven Pillars of wealth has been a massive shift away from those pensions. And you know, I suppose you can understand the reason for it. So how they work was, somebody would go to work, let's take the example of somebody who works 40 years, the same company, doesn't happen these days. But But let's imagine it did. So you got to work. And then you know, you start off with that, say 20, and you finish at 60. And you you put in your shift, how the pension worked is for each year of service. So each year you stay as an employee, you get a fraction of that a year salary kind of locked in. And the fraction in those days was known as a 60. year, so one over 60, which means if you then work 40 years, you got 4060 years of your income at the time you left. So in simple terms, two thirds, so the maximum you could get is two thirds. Now putting aside whether that's a wealth builder aspiration for financial independence, it probably isn't. Because who wants to live on two thirds what they were on before, not sure, I would like to do that. But nonetheless, two thirds was the replacement income. And for many people, they could live on that and live at a life that was worthwhile. However, in an era where interest rates are low, and stock markets are volatile, it's been frankly, impossible for the companies who set those schemes to run those. So to the point where they could set successfully have enough money to pay out those pensions and retirement. So they're now only the the domain really of the public sector, which is the civil service, the teachers, the armed forces. And the reason why they're still available for them is because really, there's no money going in, it's the taxpayer who's putting the bill, so the taxpayers of the future will be paying the teachers in the future. So there isn't a pot of money, so to speak. But for everybody else, if you work for a big company, you know, like British Airways, or Marks and Spencers or Tesco or whoever would be, then it's the company who had the job of managing money need to provide the benefit. And one could argue that's a really quite valuable benefit. But as that increasingly now diminishes, and in fact, I don't think there are any really big schemes, big employers where the pensions are open anymore to that kind of benefit has meant that you're more people are getting to the point of understanding that no matter what happens, even if the company does an outstanding job of looking after the money, and provides the financial pension at the end, because people are changing jobs and schemes are closing, they're not going to get anywhere near the two thirds.

Unknown Speaker  9:37  
So that's a kind of a big realization that the vast majority of people just simply, you know, won't be able to rely on those pensions in the future. Because you'll see most schemes are set up on a different basis, which is a different language, Chris, which is known as money purchase. What that means is who instead of the employer, paying you a pension when you retirement day, now the employer puts money into a pot. And there's a legal obligation to do that these days. And, and you so you and your employer both put into a pot, and your pot is then invested. And traditionally the plan is you invest in the stock market. And you know, we'll cover the stock market, I think in more detail in pillar three, which is investment. But suffice to say, the vast majority of people in UK have money in the stock market, where they hold their money, they pay scant attention to the funds, they kind of get a default on maybe, and then they just leave that money to reach a point when they hit retirement date, then that money is a part equal to whatever it is, say it's a few hundred thousand. So let's take an argument is 200,000. When they reach that figure, and they get to retirement age that 200,000, they now need to turn that money into an income. So they need to convert that money into an income stream from that part. And the traditional way of doing that was nudity, which basically men, you give the the lump sum back to the insurance company, and then they give you an income for the rest of your life, and maybe a pension for your spouse, and rarely Was there any pension for children. And that's certainly the case with defined benefits. There's almost nothing ever paid to children, there's no defined benefit going backwards there. Now, there's usually a pension for the person who was the employee, and then a 50% pension for a spouse, or partner. And then invariably, nothing for the kids wants it, and of education. So there was never really a legacy plan. And remember, one of the wealth building principles is the importance of building a legacy. So all of these pensions I'm talking about Chris are fundamentally flawed in one way or another, certainly defined benefit, flawed in terms of a legacy. And also increasingly companies are themselves Columbus look at the numbers of schemes that have really closed, in years VHS, Caribbean numbers appear, there are dozens and dozens of companies who just simply couldn't manage the money. And then the promise of money to come just wasn't there. I consequently their retirement that people were expecting, even in the defined benefit schemes, as either waned or is diminished massively. And with the money purchase, you're having to buy an income based on not really understanding. If you don't want to buy an annuity, you don't want to give the money away, you want to then manage that. So you sort of invest in the stock market and you draw income from the part, which is known as drawdown. So you got apart with 200,000 use, you hope you're going to make money, and you spend some of the growth and the safe drawdown rate both in the UK and US, is pretty much acknowledged at 4%. So if you got 200,000, Chris, work it out, you know, 200 grand at 4% gives you a grand, you need to know what a state pension is, if you're gonna get eight grand. So the the dramatic fall in the certainty because of the uncertainty of the stock market, and the uncertainty of how you going to convert money has meant for the vast majority of people relying on some, you know, plan to just invest and hold money for the long term and hope for the best is really caused massive problems. And if you think back to 2008, Chris, when we had the credit crunch,

Unknown Speaker  13:35  
and the stock market crash where people lost 30% 40%

Unknown Speaker  13:39  
of their money, imagine you retiring in 2008. In all of a sudden you lose 40% of your money, you can't do anything about it at all, you have no control over the timing of that. But you need the money because you no longer employed, you're heading for a whole world of hurt at a time when you could least really do with that. So I think the skill in wealth building is not to accept pensions as a buy and hope model. But rather, it's to take responsibility for seeing it as an asset that you can own and control and be part of the value creation. And we'll talk about that when we talk about SAS in the way that you could treat your pension like a business, and therefore invest in what you want to invest in to create more levels of certainty in a way that the current pension model, which frankly, in my view, Chris is broken, is fundamentally flawed. And it's perpetuated by an industry that knows the vast majority of people will just stick their money in the stock market, hold it for the long term, hope the ride is going to work out for them. But meanwhile, there's just huge fees that are that are being paid, you know, for the lifetime of that relationship with an unsuspecting fly in. And this, you know, for me just doesn't work. It's outside of wealth building principles. And I want to encourage people to really understand that pension is something they can take control of, they can learn how to manage, it's not an easy thing, you don't learn how to do it in a minute, but you can learn how to do it over several weeks or months. So not too long. And you know, you can start there. But the starting point, rather than get too heavy about this is to first of all take stock of what you got. And what we do know is many people, particularly in a world, where they're changing jobs frequently, or companies they used to work for, get taken over or they go bust or whatever can happen to those people lose track of their money, Chris, and lots and lots of evidence. And I wrote an article not long ago, I think which revealed that there's something like, you know, 10 billion, that's not 10 million, that's billion billions, you know, will not talk about small sums of money, 10 billion pounds of money that people have just forgotten about. They so out of love with their pensions, they just concerned hard, and I only work there for a year, only worked there for a few years, it's not going to make any difference, I'm not going to put in the effort to find out about that. And that's the biggest mistake you can make. So before learning how, learn what you have already, and take stock, take a stock take of who you work for where that money could be. And there are definitely ways and means of being able to track that money. And we'll hear from one person who said, Chris, really, it was nothing more than a phone call.

Unknown Speaker  16:46  
That's right, that's right. And on the government website, the pension tracing service, which will will link to in the show notes, it actually says that, on average, people have 11 jobs throughout their working life. So it's very easy, you know, for some of those early jobs that you may have thought I wasn't really, you know, earning a massive salary, there's, you know, probably hardly anything there. And you might just dismiss it very easily. But as well here very shortly from our guests, you know, that you must check every single possible pension that you think might be out there, because you just never know when you might get a really nice surprise.

Unknown Speaker  17:21  
Absolutely right. And you know, will will as possible, as we say, if we take two or three episodes on this huge subject, because it's the, it's definitely the asset, that the vast majority of the population, you know, use to build their wealth upon, you know, so when they know they're going to draw income from, but they're ill equipped to know how the income conversion works. So I'm going to try and break the myth of the stock market is the only way to do that. When you can invest in business, you can invest in property, you can become a bank and take the same profit that banks do in the same way that banks do with secure 30. With good rates of interest, there's so many ways that people can can take that that control, and, and will, we've got lots of clients who will give evidence of how they've done that, as well to bring it to life. Rather than just hear the theory. It's to hear people who've taken the lessons on board, and done dramatic things, including a dare I say, Chris, and I'm not giving financial advice. And it's important to stress that this is a podcast for education and information. And hopefully a little bit of entertainment along the way, is definitely definitely not meant to be a place of financial advice. we dispense on here, principles that we believe, you know, are fundamental, like the principle of understanding where you've what you've got principle of understanding how it works, and the principle of understanding how to get leverage on it. So that's a long way of saying there are many clients in our community greats who wrestled long and hard with the final salary pension as well have taken the steps to seek and take control of that money and dramatically improve their lives and their value the legacy, way, way, way more than the pension they would have had had they left it with their employer, but that's for them to tell. And as always, you know, this is not advice. It's just simply me saying, Hey, listen to what people are doing. Think about what's right for you make your mind up.

Unknown Speaker  19:26  
Indeed, indeed. Well, let's listen to three members of our wealth builds community now sharing their stories around how they have traced some lost money in their pensions, and I think you're really going to enjoy listening to this.

Unknown Speaker  19:41  
Okay, so I'm with Andrew basil. Welcome to wealth talk, Andrew. Hello. How you doing today?

Unknown Speaker  19:47  
Well, it's nice outside the sky is blue. The sun is shining. So awesome stuff.

Unknown Speaker  19:51  
Now, Andrew, you've managed to trace some lost money in your pension. So would you mind telling our listeners exactly how you went about that?

Unknown Speaker  19:58  
Yes, yes. Happy to do that. I'm with wealth builders with Kevin. And he's he got me into wealth builders. And I had already some money into the SAS pension kitty. And Kevin's request, he said, Are you sure things in there? Did you have any other any other funds any amount of money? I thought no, no charts, I said. But I thought that prompted me to maybe actually go and have a look. So what I did, I had a Happy Sunday afternoon. Going through some files we've got here, obviously, with all the accounts and past accounts and all the rest of it. And we're going through the old old pension files and found stuff is already there. And I found one for one Pension Fund, which I thought was in there. I did a check in the SAS kitty that is I did a check and it wasn't. And in that I thought Wow, this looks good. And so I contacted the pension fund after that and found out is hundred thousand pounds in there the value know the transfer value. So Wow. Wow. So if I Kevin, he was very happy. I was very happy. And it went into the kitchen after that.

Unknown Speaker  21:00  
Yeah, well, that is that is quite a nice surprise to find that amount of money, isn't it for sure that very,

Unknown Speaker  21:05  
very nice. So just

Unknown Speaker  21:06  
just so our listeners are very clear. So how, you know, was there a particular website? or How did you actually kind of trace that and manage to actually locate that?

Unknown Speaker  21:16  
Well, it's really a bit simpler than that. I actually just went through the files in our home offices that were looking for any old pension documentation, literally just papers, I went through it and found it found a few bits of paper there, which, you know, from a phone, which I thought was long dead or transferred and and looked into it, and then just contacted the pension provider directly. Yes, absolutely. First of all, to make sure it's still valid. Yeah, still sitting there.

Unknown Speaker  21:46  
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. And then what kind of time frames has that taken to then be able to actually, you know, get get, you know, that money? And what have you now done with that money, Andrew?

Unknown Speaker  21:56  
Well, the, the process of getting it from the pension fund into my SAS was also a threat, it took a lot of paperwork. Because it obviously don't like give me the money, but with the help from wealth builders, and so on, was able to do the correct paperwork, get it all transferred over. So it was a bit of a process, which is quite correct. By the way, we're talking serious sums of money. And I don't mind doing it. So that's, that's what went through. And then as far as going into the SAS, it's now sitting in my SAS, Kitty, which is boosted very nicely. And I've already making investments previously from the other money, so it's working very well. Wow. That's brilliant, Andrew. So your advice to anyone listening who thinks that they, you know, they

Unknown Speaker  22:40  
might just have an old pension kicking around is definitely to go and dig through those drawers and make sure that there isn't any lost money out there?

Unknown Speaker  22:48  
Yeah, absolutely. What What I do is go through those old people that don't have stuff we all hate doing, spend a Happy Sunday afternoon, maybe have a drink beforehand to help you on your way. And just go through those old files, no matter how old it sounds like, go through everything. And including your own employment records as well. Just to make sure that you got to be amazed what is lurking there that that may be valuable for you. Well done on that, Andrew, and thank you very much for sharing that with our listeners today. Okay, that's fine. That's great. enjoyed it.

Unknown Speaker  23:19  
So I'm with Chris Cook.

Unknown Speaker  23:21  
Welcome to wealth talk, Chris. Thanks, Chris. How you doing? Very good. Thank you. Now Chris, you've also managed to trace some lost money in your pension. So would you mind telling our listeners how you went about that process?

Unknown Speaker  23:33  
Sure, no problem at all. And what four h boss going back or 99 I joined the company until 2007 took voluntary redundancy and understood that it was actually a frozen was told that it was a frozen pension realized it wasn't a lot of money at the time. And I even recall making a phone call through to them and they told me it was worth about 10,000 pounds at the time that it was frozen. So basically left it took Matt Kevin sort of talking to him. He bet me 20 quid that is gonna be worth even maybe up to 60,000 sure enough, got surprised when I found that it's worth 255,000. So yeah, huge opportunity for people out there got no doubt

Unknown Speaker  24:13  
my word. So course we're talking a quarter of a million pounds there.

Unknown Speaker  24:18  
Yeah, probation the Yeah, not expecting it at all. So yeah, obviously a great surprise.

Unknown Speaker  24:23  
That certainly is now. So what exactly was the process? Did you just go back to obviously, you knew who the pension was, wherever you just called them up. And you just ask them what the value was?

Unknown Speaker  24:31  
Yeah, people believe it's a difficult process. I even sent to us or spoke to my sister about it, because she worked at middle and bank going back into the 70s and 80s. And told the very same thing. So you know, already. I told her how simple it is. Because it's a simple case of national insurance number, you give them a call and they trace it and you ask them for the value of the equity and transfer value. And yeah, took five days. It's a frustrating Wait, not knowing but then when it comes through its Yes, very nice surprise.

Unknown Speaker  25:01  
So now, obviously, you know that you have these funds, what are the plans to actually make use of them?

Unknown Speaker  25:07  
So it's very early days. And obviously there's rules because you know, that's why it's called a pension can just go and spend it and put it on red or black. So I do have by to that properties. And we're looking at buying the properties. But I do understand there's going to be limitation about we can do there. So I have a limited company that I own. In fact, I've got three but I actually sold the own one of them. So I'm going to create a SAS with pay Corp tax and it's been going on a couple years. So I understand we're going to create a another company we're going to create a SAS and then work out the plan from here.

Unknown Speaker  25:39  
Okay, great. And and myself and Kevin will be talking about exactly what a SAS is for those listening right now who maybe have heard this term come up more than once on the wealth talk podcast better. Well done again, Chris, on that. That's a very nice little surprise there. And thank you very much for sharing that with our listeners today.

Unknown Speaker  25:56  
Lovely. Thank you, Chris.

Unknown Speaker  25:58  
So I moved to Veronica, welcome to wealth talk, Veronica.

Unknown Speaker  26:01  
Hi Christian How you doing?

Unknown Speaker  26:03  
I'm good. Thank you. Good. Now,

Unknown Speaker  26:04  
Rhonda, you've managed to trace some lost money in your pension as well. Would you mind sharing with our listeners how you've gone about that?

Unknown Speaker  26:10  
Yeah, it was really straightforward. Actually, we were looking at our overall all of our pensions from past employment. And we've created a list of those that we thought we had and collected old statements to have a look at that. And then I, you know, actually woke up one morning and realized that I might have forgotten one, casting my mind back to my very first employment when I was a graduate. And you know, maybe it was a bit insignificant because I transferred actually within that company to another company. And I didn't feel like I was earning, you know, a great amount of salary at that time. But I thought it's worth investigating. So I literally googled the name of the company and their pensions department and made a phone call. So I thought rather than trying to dig out paperwork, it hadn't, you know, become obese, I had the paperwork, and I rang one number gather my national insurance number, and they can I did indeed have a pension with a transfer value of 45,000 pounds. So that was a nice day

Unknown Speaker  27:06  
to wake up to. Yeah, well, and so easy, you know, just literally within a few minutes. Pretty much you you had the good news there.

Unknown Speaker  27:14  
Yeah. And I think, you know, looking back, I might have sort of thought about it and thought, Oh, I don't know how I track that down. You know, and obviously, I didn't have that far with my other files for some reason. But, you know, I think a lot of pension companies, if you've got your insurance number, and they've got your records, it seems that, you know, they'll look it up in that way. And that's how you can get access to her.

Unknown Speaker  27:35  
Yes, that certainly shouldn't be a reason for anyone to kind of like put this off if they think that they may have a pension out there somewhere that they've forgotten about. Absolutely. Absolutely. So I guess the question is, now you've obviously found the extra money, Veronica, how is that going to change things for you in terms of your wealth building?

Unknown Speaker  27:51  
Well, it's fantastic, because we're currently setting up and Well, sorry, we have set up a SAS pension, which is a small self administered scheme, it's linked to our property business. And you know, we're looking to significantly grow that business over the next few years. And we are able to use our SaaS to help us with that, not only to invest in other people's property projects, which is a means by which we can learn and work with other people. But we also looking to lend money to our property business, to help grow that business and invest in in more assets.

Unknown Speaker  28:24  
Perfect. Well, that's brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us today, Veronica,

Unknown Speaker  28:28  
thank you. It's a pleasure.

Unknown Speaker  28:31  
Okay, so quite unbelievable. They're a total of 400,000 pounds, Kevin, just between those free members, right there. You know,

Unknown Speaker  28:40  
we didn't, we didn't hand pick these. These are things which were just, you know, really quite timely, particularly with the subject of Chris, because Chris was only sitting with me in London, a week or so ago, maybe 10 days ago. And when he was leaving the, the meeting, you know, Master to Chris, you won't forget now will hold you to this, you must go and write to that company, and find out that that pension, you will do that one year? Yes, I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it as soon as I get home. And you know, he, although it was only a little nudge for me, it was just me pressing the flesh a little. He did it. And he called me a few days later, and said, you know, Kevin, I'm shocked. You were right. I was wrong. Not that it matters who's right or wrong. But the thrill of hearing a quarter of a million pounds worth of money, which has been consigned to the history of an old employer, and what he can now do with that, and what he's now considering doing with that, and I guess we'll hear back from Chris on another day and discover what he does. But isn't that spectacular? And you know, this is just guess it's a big one. And it doesn't happen very often. But you know, 10,000, here, 15,000, there is still a massive, massive uplift terms of leverage where you thought there was nothing. Now this significant some So, you know, I'm so excited for him, I was thrilled for, at least for the rest of the days that are big smile on my face. Just hearing that, you know, Chris, who's now obviously decided to become a client of wealth builders. And we exchange a note on that this morning, which is, which is really great news. And I'm thrilled for what what he's going to get out of that discovery for himself.

Unknown Speaker  30:28  
Yeah, I think that the big message, though, is just the simplicity really, you know, someone may be thinking all this is a big task, or, you know, I don't know where all the paperwork is. And I'm just putting off for those kind of reasons. But as you've heard there from you know, certainly Veronica, they're simply just google your company, were used to work, put a phone call in, give them your national insurance number. And it can be as easy as that. You know,

Unknown Speaker  30:52  
one of the things about national insurance number is, you know, the National Insurance numbers is a really easy thing to have to hand. Once you have that to hand, you know that as a, it's almost like the key that unlocks all pensions, because the way your pensions are connected to you is through your national insurance number. And, you know, here's me on my soapbox again, Chris, you ever I said to the beginning of the podcast, there's 10 billion pounds worth of money that's been kind of forgotten and left behind, often in the hands of insurance companies. Now they know the National Insurance number of these people, don't they?

Unknown Speaker  31:28  
Yeah, I do.

Unknown Speaker  31:30  
Yes. And you know, and that's a thought provocation here, because he wouldn't take anything more than a link, a willingness to connect the National Insurance number held by these insurance companies, with the person at, you know, central HQ, ie the government to connect the two up and say, Hey, did you realize National Insurance number 1234567, you have got money owned currently in a pinch report with excellence insurer, and this is your money? It wouldn't be too difficult to do that. But nobody's going to do it. turkeys don't don't vote for Christmas, do they? insurance companies just know that if nobody claimed it, they get to keep it. So please, please, please, if you've got any money anywhere, or you suspect it, you know, give the insurance company call, give your old in insurance or go to the pension tracing agency, which is the government department in Newcastle, they still help you discover if your old employer is being bought out by another company, and things like that, because it's money that's rightfully yours. And, you know, from a wealth building perspective, that's good leverage of giving you these phone calls, you know, a few phone calls, or a few emails, can can reveal several thousand pounds of money. That's a hell of an hourly rate, Chris, I'm

Unknown Speaker  32:54  
sure is and you said, you know, rightly so there that these are just three examples that have just come up very recently, which helps we were able to share their but you know, we have many of these examples. And are there any, any things that you've seen in the past mistake? Other mistakes, perhaps that people make? Or reasons why they would put this off?

Unknown Speaker  33:11  
Yeah, they always say what, you know, go back to your point, Chris, you know, especially if they know they've got a few pensions. So, yes, there's the mistake of forgetting. But there's the mistake of remembering, you remember, you've got you know, 567 pensions even, but you just can't be bothered to put a spreadsheet together, or you can't be bothered to organize. And remember that if you move house, you know, the insurance don't all know, know where you live. So you're just getting that together. To sounds like a task too big. And I would say that, you know, within the the tasks that we said all of our wealth builder community, which has never let 30 days go by, never let a month go by without taking some action. To help build your wealth is just just do one a month, you got 72 takes you seven months, it's still done within, you know, half a year. Whereas if you don't do it, you'll never get around to it. And those people who never get round to them feel guilty. And consequently, still never get around to it. So I'd say at least take that lesson. You know, find out what you've got, make sure you get it, and then just get the statements together. Once you've got that, the next step should at least give you a sense of well, okay, I've got 100,000, I've got 200,000, or whatever I've got, at least you know what you got. And then the next step is, you know how how you then look at how to get a better return on that. And that's where, you know, we have this, this phrase we use Chris in pensions that most pensions need the kiss of life. We call it the CPR. And the CPR that we recommend. Everybody does. Now some people will do on their own, which Why are we not Jim. And we can help support that is a review of the charges, which is see the performance, which is the P and the R which is the risk. And many people simply don't know whether they're getting value for money. So you don't know what they're paying in fees, the average person in the UK, Chris is paying 2%, approximately in total fees. So you know, if we were given the example of a 200,000, pensions, I think that figure I picked at the beginning of podcasting, it was 200,000, then typically they're paying 4000 pounds a year, in fees, that's a hell of a lot of money, you know, we can show you definitely show you how you can manage your pension yourself. And that saves you four grand at that four grand, okay, might say might cost you something but even cost you a few hundred pounds, and you say three and a half thousand or 3000, it's still an awful lot of money, which is yours compounded year in year out year in year out. And you can learn how to just you don't have to be an expert doesn't take more than a few hours a month. You know, it's nothing more than that. And we'd like you to be aware of what you got. Understand that your pension needs a review CPR, you can do it yourself, we'll teach you how we can do it with you and give you extra support and help you understand then what you do after that, which is then, you know, after the kiss of life, you need to recuperate, you need to do something else, to turn that pension into something that could work for you whether it's a SAS or not, whether it's just a lower cost pension, whether it's just a different way of managing your relationship with it. So you were what you've got, or even if it's understanding. It's a platform on which to build the rest of your wealth. So you know, we don't always have to change everything, particularly if it's a really good pension or you're really happy with it. It's just working out then how it fits into the jigsaw puzzle, all of the other Seven Pillars working together. And that's that's what I would take from that cruise.

Unknown Speaker  37:06  
Yeah, yeah.

Unknown Speaker  37:08  
We've covered a lot in this episode today, Kevin, but I think just before we sign out for today, and we look forward to next week's episode is is this this topic of sass, which we've heard a few times from our guests today as well. So So what will we be talking about specifically next week, and I know we've got some more of our members who are going to share, specifically how they've used a SAS and exactly how that's helped them in their wealth building journey as well.

Unknown Speaker  37:34  
Yeah, well, you know, I think what I've said before about concept of SAS, small self administered scheme, look, it wouldn't win any marketing titles. I didn't invent it government rules. But like in America, you know, they've got a pension over there called a 401k. Wow. You know, it doesn't tell you what it does on the tin does it? You know, so similarly, a SAS doesn't tell you too much, except that it's the domain of entrepreneurs. And if we really get under the skin of wealth building is a process. Yeah, wealth flows to value value is created best by being entrepreneurial about your thinking. So if you're an entrepreneur, in your mind, in spirit, then in action, as SAS is the perfect vehicle for an entrepreneur, because it allows you to take control of the pension, you become the legal owner of the pension for the first time in your life. And then with some skill, which you know, some teachings with some learnings, again, not difficult, not difficult at all, please don't think it's hard work. It is not? Yes, you take responsibility. Once you have that responsibility, you can control that vehicle, massively changed the dynamics of your costs, your performance, and your risks in a way that suits you. And, and so much evidence that people do do a much better job, lower fees, higher performance, even lower risks, when they're much more in control. And to be in control, Chris, you have to be thinking like a business owner. And in reality, those people who will qualify because it is a qualification for a SAS, you have to be a business owner. So at some point, everybody who's wealth building needs to be a business owner. Don't worry, if you're not, don't worry, if you're an employee, don't worry, if you're self employed, at some point, you will need to work on the principle of becoming a business owner as you build your wealth. And then a SAS can help you on that journey. I think we've got some initial videos, Chris, which just kind of introduced at a higher level. The common habits is a TV interview I did in TV on Sky TV, which talks about SAS and then from our training suite, we've got a very simple. So what is a SAS in a way that we normally deliver our training, which is delivered by our SAS expert? Well, Bill is a guy called Paul Brooks, who's just brilliant at what he does. And he's a brilliant teacher. And he will, we got a video from him. And he, he runs the entire training program for our SAS trustees. So whatever they need to learn, we've got a training module for that, to make sure that people are compliant, they're confident, they're competent. And when you combine those things, then just like being a business owner, you have to be compliant, you have to be confident, you have to be competent. And if you are those things, you turn your pension intro dramatically higher performing vehicle than the ones that we've been talking about, where people tend to leave their money parked, as opposed to being driven.

Unknown Speaker  40:46  
And we have actually got those videos and a whole bunch more in our members area and free to access that just head on over to wealth builders.co.uk forward slash resources. And not only do you get access to the members area of all the videos that you get the Seven Pillars of wealth, ebook, and a bunch of other wealth building resources as well. So next week, having a telling me this is the point at which pensions get a little bit sexy.

Unknown Speaker  41:12  
Well, you know, I gotta tell you this, Chris, right, because we will probably reveal more next time. But in recent months, I've been involved in meetings, okay, where I do a q&a session to help people really get the message. And we've been in a room with 100 to 120 people, and there's a buzz in the room. And guess what the subject is? Its pensions, its people learning that if they control that, they get a better return for themselves. They help their business, they get a better return for their spouse or loved one. And they absolutely leave a intergenerational tax free legacy that will go from one generation to the next next to the next to the next in a way that no pension ever does that when it comes from the place of convention, and from the industry helping themselves to fees and charges that they have no right to levy. So more of that in the next episode. Chris,

Unknown Speaker  42:18  
we if that isn't enough reason to tune in for next week's episode. I don't know what is so when thanks so much for your clear explanations around pensions today. And thank you to our guests for sharing. And I look forward to speaking to you again next week. Kevin. See ya.

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