Premier FX collapse – What to do next for customers

The much talked about UK election is now well and truly behind us, how can the opinion polls have been so wrong you may be asking yourself, it had most investors worried about a hung parliament or even a Labour victory which we were led to believe would send the markets crashing down around us.

Well now you can let out a sigh of relief, or can you, the result was taken well by the UK equity markets and in the short term should provide businesses with a stable political and legislative background in which to invest for the future.

However it is debatable as to whether the UK election results will have any impact on interest rates, the Bank of England voted last week to keep the base rate at 0.50%. Official figures at the end of the last month showed the total size of the economy increased by just 0.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2015. That was half the 0.6 per cent growth rate seen in the previous quarter and the worst performance since late 2012 – raising fears that the recovery is running out of steam.

It has just become more straightforward for those looking to transfer their pensions into a QROPS in France, with many pension providers promising to drastically reduce their exit charges in the wake of comments from Chancellor George Osborne saying he will introduce legislation to cap costs.

This comes in the wake of concerns that some savers have been discouraged from making the most of flexible pensions access because of exit charges of between 5% and 10%.

Osbourne commented, “The government will not allow financial firms to rip off customers who have spent their working lives saving hard for retirement.”