to not want to put money in DH pension and not mine?

I know an older couple who did this, planned to live on one very healthy pension together to the end.
He now is in a nursing home with dementia but very healthy, not going anywhere any time soon. All of the pension was his name and is being used to fund him as having so much makes him not eligible for much of anything and she is left living on her state pension only and things are tight for her.
Lesson learned her daughters and their husbands are now making sure to split the pensions they are paying into to make sure bother have money in their names so this doesn't happen to them.

As I posted above, this is the exact situation of my Mum and Dad although the money involved was a lot less. My Dad actually went into a care home because he'd had a stroke and the NHS paid for the first month or so. When he didn't particularly engage with physio everyone realised he wasn't coming out so he had to start paying what he could. At no point was my Mum's situation taken into account aside from the fact that the house could not be sold with her living in it and she was entitled to half of his private pension every month.

She's actually better off financially now he's dead because that particular pension pays her his whole private pension plus she's entitled to some complicated part of his state pension - pretty sure the rules over that have changed now. I'm not sure that many people are aware of this.

Women need to look after their own retirement provision. The risk ( outside public sector pensions where there tend to be automatic fixed widow/dependant pensions) is that at the point of retirement the men opt to take the highest pension annuity available ie one just for them in their lifetime.
Adding a woman on reduces the annuity rate as women live longer than men. Adding a woman on and opting for her to receive the same amount (not eg just 50%) of the annuity will reduce the amount even more.

Many, many (very nice ? ) men ime will opt for the higher amount benefiting only them because they won't gamble on their wives outliving them.

F

Ah, okay, so what he is doing is plausible. He puts £0.60 into a pension, he gets £1 because of tax relief. You have to put in £0.80 to get the same. So let's use small numbers to illustrate. If he puts £600 into his pension, he gets £1,000. On retirement he takes his 25% tax free allowance, that's £250, and puts it in a pension for you. You have, together, £1k of pension for £600.

If instead he put in enough only for £750 into his pension and you put in enough for £250 into yours right now then that will cost you a combined £650 because you have less tax relief.

So there is a plausible reason to do that but my caution would be that tax can change and his pension could well end up with a savings ceiling on it again, or the tax free allowance might drop from 25% to something smaller. If that happened and he had to instead 1) get an annuity in his name that carried on paying you after his death and 2) had to pay income tax without being able to use your personal allowance then you are going to be worse off.

The above is the real issue. People making claims about the risk it would put you at if he left you are talking nonsense really. As long as you know where he is saving that pension, the courts will always equalise pensions on divorce in a long marriage like yours unless there is some other asset that you take the lion's share of.

He must be coming close to his lifetime limit? Makes more sense to shore up your pension given it's so low, when it comes to withdrawal your tax burden will be lower. Anyhow that's what we are doing - building my pension up - dh has stopped paying into his pension.

Don't put everything in his pension.

I know an older couple who did this, planned to live on one very healthy pension together to the end.
He now is in a nursing home with dementia but very healthy, not going anywhere any time soon. All of the pension was his name and is being used to fund him as having so much makes him not eligible for much of anything and she is left living on her state pension only and things are tight for her.
Lesson learned her daughters and their husbands are now making sure to split the pensions they are paying into to make sure bother have money in their names so this doesn't happen to them.

You can if it’s a defined contribution pension (which is what most people have nowadays in
the private sector).

If you have used the funds in the pension to buy an annuity, yes correct, it’s only your spouse who can receive this

You should be considering the tax both on payments into the pension as well as payments out.

It seems as though as marginal increases to his pension will be taxed at 40% or more. What will your pension be taxed at? There may be uncertainty but I suspect there will be a future tax benefit for you to have a higher pension taxed at a lower rate than your husband.

@yellowcuptea - you would get tax relief on any contributions to your pension, no matter where the money comes from.

Agree that you need to see a financial advise for all-round financial advice, though.

You can't elect for anybody but spouse to get a widow or widower pension

This is the first thing you need to know

What are you worried about? After that length of marriage, you will be entitled to half his pension won't you?

I am reasonably sure you get the tax benefits by paying into a pension, it doesn’t have to be your own.

so it makes no difference if he pays into yours rather than his. In fact it can be more advantageous paying into yours as yours is lower.

i’ve had a quick google which seems to agree. Not an expert though.

ETA we work the other way, we live off my salary and put dh’s into his pension. I am the higher earner, dh took the paycut to be around for the teens. I also have a public sector pension. Tax wise it doesn’t appear to make a difference whose pension we pay into.

Well, then it makes a lot of sense to put money in to his pension.

This is what we did (although my husband was only a 40% tax payer), but our finances are completely intertwined so it did not bother me.

In that position my h topped up my pension so it was more equal to his. Why doesn't yours do that?

What's he generally like with money?

DC pensions- depends what you’ve done with it. If you bought an annuity, whether it pays out to anyone else depends on the terms.

Not in a million.

I'm a divorcee and pensions were kept off the table despite huge inequalities (yes I had a barrister, the judge just refused to take them into account).

So don't assume anything.

It depends on the type of pension.
A DC pension (pot of money) is inherited.
A DB pension (promise to pay according to a set of rules) generally has a 'survivors' pension like your mother's 50% but each scheme has different rules, there is no single answer.

If it were more tax efficient, I would.

@yellowcuptea think he is being a chancer!