Spotlight On … Clifford Knezovich – IFA

There’s quite a buzz around pensions at the moment – and rightly so, as they provide the backbone of our income in our later years. But currently, pension deficits are hitting the news, and figuring them out can still prove difficult.

Pension deficits concern what are commonly known as “final salary pensions” or Defined Benefit schemes.   Final salary or defined benefit (DB) schemes are essentially occupational pension schemes that provide a set level of pension at retirement, the amount of which normally depends on your service and earnings at retirement or in the years immediately preceding when you retire. Because your pensionable salary is used as one part of the formula in order to calculate your pension, a final salary scheme is commonly referred to as a ‘salary related’ scheme. Two common examples of ‘final pensionable salary’ would be your last year’s pensionable earnings or an average of your last 3 years’ pensionable salary.

Recently, there have been high-profile failures of these systems, such as the folding of Monarch Airlines – and the collapse of their pension fund. Initially, it appeared that owners could still walk away with a profit (after new hands tried to turn the airline into a more accessible and “Ryanair-like” product) by offloading debts, and this included dropping the pension fund. Ironically, this was once a major credit to the business. The fund, which is now in the Pension Protection Fund (PPF), had been under speculation of being left short when the business first began to struggle back in 2014, after years of asset-stripping.

Expatriate Brits living in Germany have been advised to look into the possibility of becoming German citizens, as, amongst other things, naturalisation is likely to make the practicalities of Germany wealth management more straightforward.

Expat group British in Germany has said that British people living in the country should act quickly as it will likely be harder to achieve citizenship if the UK leaves the EU on March 29 2019 without a deal. In the event a deal is reached, Brits will have until 31 December 2020 to apply for dual citizenship, according to Germany’s foreign ministry.

Effectively, this means that if Brits want to be able to ensure dual citizenship, they must act quickly as a no deal scenario could mean they have to renounce their British citizenship if they wish to become German citizens. The sooner Brits attend the Ausländerbehörde (Foreigners’ Registration Office) for advice the better their chances of securing a favourable outcome.