Should you decide to leave the UK, under current regulations you can either continue to hold your UK-based personal pension fund or choose to transfer the balance into an approved pension fund in your new country of residence.
The benefit of transferring your fund abroad is that this gives you more flexibility with your investments. This is because under current UK legislation, if you continue to hold retirement savings in a UK pension fund, you will be required to use the lump sum to purchase an annuity upon retirement.
Although annuities (a type of financial product that provides a set income for life) can be favourable investments, many Antipodeans will not have large enough retirement savings in the UK to purchase a very beneficial income in retirement.
If you feel that you may want to transfer your funds abroad at some stage in the future, you should consider the exit and transfer fees charged by the provider of your initial UK pension fund before signing up.
