Suddenly the P word is all over the media. Dispatches on Channel 4 shows “Who stole my Pension?”  http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/episode-guide/series-3/episode-6 While the programme has some distinguished contributors, the omission of the much-quoted £1.2 Trillion (1,200,000,000,000) public sector pensions cost is bizarre. Then Shadow Chancellor George Osborne mentions a proposed increase in the State Retirement Age to 66. The related issue of long-term care becomes a bidding war with Labour’s £20,000 one-off premium   http://www.georgeemsden.co.uk/2009/07/rita-hayworth-and-the-shawshank-redemption/ being seriously undercut by the Tories £8,000 scheme.

Paying £8,000 or £20,000 as a one-off premium seems to be a number plucked out of the air although its proposers say it can be self-funding? But until the calculations are out in the public domain, this seems cloud cuckoo land – a phrase used about public sector pensions in the Channel 4 programme.  The related issue of the cost of care in old age came up last week at a friend’s Ruby wedding (40 years) anniversary party when a cost of £1,000 a week for a residential care was mentioned – not including nursing care of course. 

The scheme will only work if it is compulsory as few will want to pay either figure until they are on the point of needing care and the problem with elderly people is that life (health really) can change overnight – in my own experience, often as a result of a fall. Commercially available long-term care was withdrawn years ago as people were leaving applying for it until the last minute so it was a case of when people were going to claim rather than if. Only one company offers pre-funded care policies now and they are much more expensive than previous rates http://www.partnership.co.uk/ They will not deal direct with the public and if your own adviser has not passed the requisite CF8 paper, they are not permitted to give advice here.

Regarding a higher retirement age, let me mention again a grisly statistic. Raising the retirement age to 70 means that 27% men and 17% women will die before receiving their pension. A huge disadvantage of the State Pension is that you cannot pass it on (if you haven’t taken it, you lose it) unlike a private one where your fund will be passed onto your beneficiaries if you die before taking your benefits.

Raising the retirement age is going to mean a huge extra cost for employers. Currently, the highest age employee benefit insurers will provide for is 65 so people working beyond that age or their scheme retirement age, lose these benefits from the employer e.g. Death-in-Service benefit, pension contributions, group sickness insurance, group private medical insurance. At a retirement planning meeting recently with an employed client, I suggested that he get an illustration for continuing his private medical insurance beyond his planned retirement age of 62. He was quoted a cost of £500 per month.

People who work beyond their employer’s standard retirement age are clearly disadvantaged raising some interesting questions with new anti age discrimination legislation. Having employee benefits finish at say, age 60 when the Employer’s Retirement Age is say, 65 can also be dangerous for employers. Last week, found a case of this where an employee who had been ill for 7 years had reached the age of 60 and the insurance benefit stopped. Question was, Can he be dismissed? The lower age for the employee benefits was presumably done to save costs, but will now be expensive to sort out – classic case of not having insurance being more expensive than having it.

BRX Bond Street www.brxbondstreet.co.uk brings some interesting different angles including one from the accountant www.sayersb.co.uk We are in a pre-election period and over the last few years, many government services have been outsourced to the private sector. With some serious spending cuts on the way, firms which have built their business model on this (government bodies will generally pay their bills and don’t go bust) could be in for a tough time. Other members are busy too including a (high end) property finder where the market varies street by street with some distressed sales but no one dares mention this – never was keeping up appearances more important. Great story too from Des Sutton of www.manbytesdog.com who was able to replace a client’s laptop with all the previous settings, the same afternoon when the hard disc fried in the morning.

Staying with laptops, the Antiques Roadshow http://www.bbc.co.uk/showsandtours/beonashow/antiques.shtml where I have yet to see an uninteresting edition, reminds me that lap desks or scriptoires/escritoires have a been around and a status symbol for a long time. These led to the invention of the brief case and if you thought a desk for example was just a desk, have a look here  http://www.achome.co.uk/antiques/vintage_office.htm N.B. you will have to scroll down a bit.

Finally, an eye test reminder draws up some interesting trivia and history here  http://www.glassesdirect.co.uk/guide-to-vision/history-of-glasses/ including: spectacles have probably prevented the world being run by people under 40 and while babies cry, they don’t produce tears until they are 1 to 3 months sold.