Yet another petition on pensions
Update on the petition for Sgt Anderson. The government suddenly got interested and managed to sort out his request to transfer to another corps in the Army. He will not now be made redundant in Tranche 3 (no guarantee for tranche 4 though... but at least he will be over the immediate pension line).
The petition was also meant to highlight the plight of all those made redundant just short of their immediate pension. As Sgt Anderson's situation has been resolved the others affected have had to set up a new petition here. All those affected would appreciate it if you would take a moment to sign the new petition and spread the word far and wide.
It has been frustratingly difficult to get any information out of either the MOD or government on the situation. The Army Redundancy Cell refused to answer questions and direct us to the Freedom of Information (FOI) Request route. When FOIs were submitted the responses were slow and often refused due to cost and time implications.
The Minister for Armed Forces finally admitted in the House of Commons that for the sake of 1 day of service the difference in pension and redundancy remuneration is £100,000 (for those financiers this was at discounted present capital values and after 40% tax rate). The hansard link is here.
For those interested in the new pension and abatement/adjustment of salary. There is a document available 20131001A_FAQs_V9_U.pdf which briefs the military community that "Nothing is actually deducted from military pay (no 'abatement' or 'adjustment' is made) but the relative value is included as part of the pay comparability considerations." If the pensions value is taken into consideration in pay comparability then it does affect the amount of money those in the military receive into their bank accounts. It is merely semantics arguing otherwise.
The same document also informs people why those with less than 10 years to their normal retirement age will not have to move onto the 2015 pension scheme. This is because they will have less time to adjust their financial plans to reflect the changes to their pension schemes.... So where was the same consideration when making people redundant days before qualifying for their immediate pension.
The standard argument wheeled out by the government to defend the situation is, there had to be a line. This isn't quite correct, if the redundancy package had been set up fairly there wouldn't be a point in a persons length of service that created such a difference in the financial package. There would be a line for whether you were redundant or not but there wouldn't have been the financial cliff edge around the immediate pension point.
Rant ends...
Last edited by Yorkie666; 22nd Jan 2014 at 16:47.