Police Pension

Hi to you all..........this forum stuff is new to me so apologies if I mess up along the way. I am particularly interested in the issue of Police Pensions as I am in the process of divorcing after 24 yrs together and three chidren. I am interested in the issue of seeking a proper value to the pension as I am led to believe that the CETV is incorrect and need the help of an accurer?? Where do i find a decent one that will not take the last of my savings?!! Can anyone tell me whether this is worth doing or just another costly exercise! Help very much appreciated. xx

If you put 'Police Pension' into the search box at the top of the page you'll get some really good threads on the subject. If you want to share the pension you would probably find an actuarial report helpful, and there is a good company who posts on this site or I'm sure your solicitor will have an actuary s/he uses, if you want to off-set the pension, then I'm not sure it would be so helpful but I could be wrong here and the answer to that might be in th existing threads.

Good luck

Hi there

Any of the uniformed services pensions should always be valued by an actuary as the way the pension provider calculates the CETV actally de-values it. It is worth getting this done - Peter from BDM (an actuarial firm) will undoubtedly be along very soon with some very sound advice.

Amanda

I could not resist Amanda’s heavy hint, so here goes.

The CETV will undervalue the pension and the police scheme is one of the worst in this regard. Nothing sinister here, merely an unintended consequence of the pension sharing regulations and some of the special features of the scheme.

The appropriateness of the CETV is a significant issue if you are likely to offset, less so if considering pension sharing. However, pension sharing in any of the uniformed services schemes has lots of complications and associated costs.

The pension will be a significant issue for you and the value of this asset will be high. There is no one solution that suits everyone – sharing, offsetting or attachment. It is vital that the pension is considered along side all the other financial assets and a workable solution sought. Unless the costs are relatively trivial (£100 or less) I suggest that you do not spend money on actuarial reports (even from us) until you have some clear ideas on what outcomes you want concerning the pension.

Peter.

Hi

thank you so much..........way over my head at the moment but hopefully now that I have found this site progress will be made. My husband's proposal is that I have the equity in the house and he keeps his pension. On paper this looks quite good in my favour but only so far as the initial CETV shows. I have been advised that the pension forecast is wholly innaccurate, especially in view of the latest news regarding male police officers now having an increase in the lump sum payout in line with that of females.

The CETV was done long before this decision was made and since he is an Inspector then I am wondering how much more his pension is worth. If having it reviewed means it increasing by many thousands, then I would be mad to let it go.

What does the process of seeing an accurer entail, how long does it take, is it action I can take without his approval and what sort of costs can I expect to have to pay?

Have to go back to work now, but thank you so much!
x

Offsetting the pension against the value of the house sounds a sensible option, provided the offset is NOT ­base­d on the scheme CETV.

An actuary should do the valuation you need (although I like the idea of an accurer much more). The good news is that you do not actually need to see one. That should not be inflicted on anyone, trust me, I work with them! It can be quite easy to instruct an actuary to produce the valuation report you need and it is almost invariably done by letter, or using forms designed for the purpose by the actuarial firm. Valuation reports can be quite expensive, for a report admissible in court; you should expect to pay between £475 and £1,000 + VAT. Ideally, you would not have to pay all this yourself. If you and your husband agree to a joint instruction, then you will each pay half. If his is unwilling to cooperate, the court may instruct that a joint instruction be made.

I know that you are looking at offsetting now but this may well change, as I will attempt to explain. The fair actuarial value of your husband’s pension is likely to be significantly more than the CETV. It could be worth two or three times as much. This could change your husband’s (and your) views on offsetting. Therefore, you may find that the possibility of pension sharing comes into the reckoning or even a hybrid where your share of the pension is reduced in return for another asset – such as the house. You will need a rather more complex actuarial report if this happens, in which case the cost will increase by anything between a quarter and half. These reports should only take a matter of a week or so to produce.

There is a potential issue for you regarding offsetting in that some courts take the view that the full value of the pension should not be used when offsetting. From an actuarial perspective, this is a flawed argument but it is difficult to persuade some courts on this issue. Amanda may comment on this issue if pressed!

My feeling is that your husband’s view of the offsetting prospect might change when the full value is known. So you might like to get a better idea of what his pension is worth. I will send you a PM about this to avoid blatantly advertising through forum posts.

Peter.

I will survive!!!!!!!!!!

Having gone through three years of hell ­base­d on my husbands police pension with his former ex wife! My advice to you is forget acturies reports!
WASTE OF TIME AND MONEY!!!!!!

I promise you, you go down that route and it will cost you more than money!

In our case, my husband, his former ex wife, decided she wanted 80% of his pension! ­base­d on her daft report from an actuary, that cost HER a thousand pound!!!
She then had to submit two more reports, the first one was flawed big time. And that was from an actuary who is from a big company advertising on the net!(if you send me a PM I will name the company involved so you dont get caught out by them) because MOST solicitors use them! Can I just clarify its in no way shape or form linked to peter@bdm's firm!he seems a lovely, honest and trustworthy man!
They failed to take me into account, I had been telling them for past 3 years, I am his wife and some now belongs to me! They wouldnt accept that, But the Judge did at the FH! So off she went to get another report!
Long stroy cut short.......
My husband offered her 50% from when they were married, she refused. (they had been divorced 5 years)She wanted 80%/then 70% then 65% and wouldnt budge even when the facts were staring her and her lawyers in the face!
The end result?

She got 30% and it cost her in lawyers fees THIRTY THOUSAND POUNDS TO GET IT!!!
She lost her house and now lives in a caravan!

There is an EASY SIMPLE way of valuing a police pension and it gets the exact SAME results as if spending 1k on an acturies report!
My husband prepared it for court, showing what his ex was entitled to, because her lawyers did not understand or trust us, they advised her to get the report done, it cost her £1900 to get it!
End result? Was exactly the same result as my husbands calculations!
If you want to PM me I will give you the simple solution! One that wont cost you a penny! One thats simple enough for us daft lot who are not "experts" in this field, to understand! In fact pm me and I will email you it.
Kind ones
Louise