Current Testing
In the next few days, we will contact people who previously helped with testing to meet regulatory requirements. This will cover two additional pages. These pages link our plans to a new product called GuiidePath.
Created in collaboration with Pathlines Pensions UK Limited (“Pathlines”), this offers a unique drawdown solution for anyone at or around ten years from retirement.
Your Guiide plan will the passed to your GuiidePath product and enable Pathlines to facilitate the payment of any lump sums and income payments you have chosen in your Guiide plan . It will also allow you to track its progress easily. You can then adjust your plan when needed. Finally, once you choose your investments, it will show you how many of your payments rely on taking investment risk.
All this individual support can be provided through our unique guidance approach. This is without crossing the boundary into advice. Once final user-testing and regulatory sign-offs are complete, we will extend this feature to include a partner’s income, which lots of people want.
This will initially be available in our planning tool and later added as a feature within GuiidePath. More details on both will follow soon. In time, we also plan to support drawdowns from ISAs and other savings pots.
This will not be the right solution for everyone. Given this, we have added some alternatives to the site in new updates to help our users, depending on what they want.
If you want Advice
Neither Guiide or Pathlines can provide advice and GuiidePath is an unadvised product. It cannot recommend where to invest your money or whether the product is suitable for you – these decisions remain yours to make.
We recognise that many users would prefer formal recommendations based on their Guiide plan, alongside tax advice (particularly regarding potential inheritance tax issues). To support this, we are introducing new options directly on the site.
Have under £250K in pots?
Whole-of-market advice can be difficult to access for pot sizes under £250k. LV= provides this service to any Guiide user in the UK with total pots under £250k.
LV= have been specialising in providing financial advice to people looking to access their pension for over 25 years. Their aim is to help you make better informed choices so that planning for retirement is as easy as possible. They will help you understand your retirement options, researching and recommending options from the whole market. You can visit their retirement advice site by clicking on their logo.
Have over £250K in pots?
Finding advice with more than £250k in pots is easier, but knowing where to look can still be a challenge. While online meetings are increasingly common, if you prefer face-to-face help, a local financial adviser is ideal – especially as they often have a better understanding of regional living costs.
We have added a range of regional UK advisers, ensuring they hold the necessary regulatory permissions, offer pricing we would expect, and demonstrate a customer-first approach. We plan to expand this directory further based on user demand.
Before advice, if you like, we can share an anonymous copy of your Guiide plan with a local adviser. If they confirm they can assist, we will pass on your details so they can get in touch with you.
After advice we can follow up to ensure you were satisfied with the process and share any feedback, questions, or compliments directly with the adviser.
Below is a screenshot of our new page for those with over £250K in total pots. This can be accessed by logging into Guiide. Just click here.
Once in, just visit the Dashboard page and view the Adviser page on the left hand side menu. Select your region from the dropdown to find an adviser.
If you want to choose from a Wide Investment Range
GuiidePath will only offer a limited range of investment choices. A Money fund, an Income fund and a Growth fund. The balance between these will be your choice after considering the risks involved, which we will illustrate based on your plan. This is designed to make things simple when used in conjunction with a Guiide plan.
If you prefer to take control yourself and feel confident selecting from a wider investment range, Interactive Investor provides a broader option.
They have an investment range including tracker and active funds over many different asset classes and individual shares, bonds and gilts. They also have a fixed price monthly fee which appears very low as a percentage of assets if you have larger pots.
If DIY feels the right choice for you and you are confident investor, you can discover more on their investment range and fees by clicking on the image below
If you want some Guaranteed Income
For many, some guaranteed income may be the right choice. If you have taken tax free cash already, or plan to, you may wish to use some of your remaining pot to buy some annual income which is fully guaranteed. This can be done by buying an annuity.
If you get a quote, then you can come back to Guiide with that quote and model it. Just reduce your pension pot by the amount of any intended purchase and add the income the annuity provides into the Other Income section of the Haves page. You can then decide if it seems right for you. If you do make a purchase, that income can stay in there for future modelling.
As long term interest rates have been increasing recently, pricing is the best it has been for a very long time.
Retirement Line are the UK’s largest annuity broker and can provide quotes on lots of different types of annuities. With/without increases. Single/joint life and even temporary annuities (so some income to State Pension Age for example).
In addition, by getting to know your health situation better they can look to find you the best price from the whole market. Without any information, annuity providers assume you are in perfect health. This means worse pricing, so it’s always best to provide what you can. To get an accurate quote just click the image below.
Some other smaller updates
If your expected retirement date has passed since your last visit, you can now update your retirement status manually under settings in the ‘You’ page if an option was clicked incorrectly.
We have added a ‘Living’ benchmark to the ‘Wants’ page. Based on the Real Living Wage, this serves as a more realistic minimum standard for anyone renting in retirement (as minimum and other benchmark standards assume zero housing costs).
If you have any question at all, please contact us at contact@guiide.co.uk. We are always happy to help with any questions at all.
Disclosures
To be completely clear Guiide has commercial relationships with every entity above. That is how we can provide our site for free to everyone. They may license a version of our model, or pay us a referral fee if you choose their services or products. This does not affect any cost of advice, or price of any annuity or product provided to you.
Many other providers, annuity brokers and advisers are available and you can visit Moneyhelper if you need help on this.
Remember when investing your capital is at risk
Information and calculations provided by this website are intended as guidance only to assist your retirement planning and does not in any way constitute financial advice in any form. Bespoke Retirements Ltd trading as Guiide (Company number SC463898) is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Firm Reference Number (FRN) is 1031526.
