Advice on NHS pensions

[Sunny36]

Hello
I have paid into an NHS pension for the past 15 years- mostly at part time hours due to having children although I do have a couple of years at full time hours.

I'm coming up to 37 and want to start thinking about the future a bit more. I have tried speaking to our NHS pensions department but get no sense of them.

Does anyone know of a way to increase my NHS pension or can anyone recommend a reputable private pension- I'm a bit hesitant with a private pension as fear loosing my money.

Also does anyone know if it is possible to set up a pension for my children now (they are 11 & 13 ) so that they get a head start.

My current retirement age is 68 and NHS pension is in line with state pension. I can take it earlier but with reductions so hoping to boost this somehow.

On track for full state pension as is my husband but he only has the People's Pension that was introduced a few years back so don't think he will get much from that.

We don't own our home and looks very unlikely that we will ever buy a home so will likely be renting in retirement so need a good pot.

Any advice greatly appreciated. Thank you 😊

I don’t think you’ll get many recommendations on private pensions, but I just googled ‘how to increase my nhs pension’ for you
https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/member-hub/increasing-your-pension

have you googled if you can set up pensions for your children?

There’s a great nhs pensions facebook group that it may be worth you looking at. Search your questions on there.

For children, you can set up a JSIPP.

NHS pension has various options:

• Buy extra pension in the main scheme. You buy a defined amount of extra annual pension (increments of £250, up to a max of approx £8k a year). You can pay for this in 1 lump or in instalments. (Note that if you pay in a single lump you have to claim the tax back yourself.) If you do this, you have to take it when you take the main pension, no flexibility, but its guaranteed for life and goes up with inflation.
• Pay AVCs (additional voluntary contributions) to one of the NHS-linked private pension providers or pay into a SIPP. Both of these buy you a defined contribution 'pension pot' - more flexible in terms of when you can take it, and how much you take at a time. But you're in charge of making the money last - it could run out.
• ERRBO - buying down your pension age. This doesn't actually increase your pension, but means you can take it earlier without the usual reduction. Lowest age you can buy down to is 65. And it only buys down the age for the part of the pension built up after you start paying the ERRBO premium, not pension you've already built up.

If you're on Facebook, join the NHS Pensions members group, and the Pengage public sector pensions one. The former is run by members, the latter by a financial advisor who has lots of free webinars to help you understand the NHS scheme.

Are you sure you're retirement age is 68? If you've had continuous service for 15 years you've likely got some money in the 1995 scheme (retirement age is 60 in this scheme) .
As people explained you can add to your pot, but best way is to work more and progress up the bands as then you get the employer continuing contribution too.

You can open a SIPP instead of/as well as making additional NHS pension contributions. I would recommend looking at the Rebel Finance course which is free and talks about pensions alongside all the rest of their finance advice.

Employer contribution is meaningless in the NHS scheme. Progressing up bands/increasing hours will increase the pension because it increases your salary - which is the basis of the pension calculation.

And 15 years takes us back to 2011. Which means the first part of the OP's pension will be in the 2008 scheme (retirement age 65) not the 1995 one.