Shocked at how much my pension estimate has gone down

[Don'tcallthepolice]

I have a final salary and a career average pension pot from a 30 year career in the public sector (BBC). I check it annually and am shocked to see both are 2/3 the value on this time last year.

I have 5 years to retirement and imagine all I can do is cling on in hope that it goes back up.

Is anyone else shocked at such a heavy loss 6 months on from Liz Truss's up?

I’m surprised - I (naively?) thought the whole point of those schemes was that they are ‘defined benefit’ ie you get a multiple of your career average and they’re not affected by financial markets in the same way as private sector defined contribution schemes. Or am I wrong??

I have a local government one btw - few years final salary but mostly career average

You don’t have a pot with final salary or career average pensions. You get a set amount of money every year for the whole of your retirement. There may be a figure given, which is the equivalent of your pension as a cash pot, but that’s irrelevant, unless you wanted to cash it out.

Not a pension but I had an inheritance invested in Fidelity. Used to make me money all the time which I took out to spend.

Now it’s less than I put in and has been since Covid struck.

Getting impatient as it’s my fun money.

They’re defined benefit schemes so the annual amount you will be paid is the same as it was last year (except for revaluation / new accrual if you’re still employed). The “value” you are taking about is the lump sum you would be able to transfer out of the scheme and that has gone down because interest rates are higher (globally not just in the UK). Don’t worry, this has no impact on you assuming you were planning to receive your pension monthly from the scheme as the majority of people do.