Retirement group Phoenix enters £197m pensions deal with Irish Life July 13, 2021 Retirement group Phoenix is set to sell Ark Life Assurance Company to pensions group Irish Life for around £197m, the retirement group today. Ark Life Assurance Company, known as Ark Life, added around £1.8bn of assets under administration to Phoenix’s heritage division as of 31 December. The deal, which is expected to be completed by [...]
Payouts may be given to families to offset higher gas bills under new green government plan July 9, 2021 Families may be provided with cash payouts to offset the cost of higher gas bills under a new green government plan. Whitehall advisors have been discussing plans to compensate households for the more expensive gas bills which will arise from the government push to reduce carbon emissions. The proposals will be aimed at encouraging households [...]
UK shoppers sticking with online shops despite restrictions relaxing June 29, 2021 Online e-commerce sales continued to grow in April, despite the reopening of non-essential retail across the UK. Demand for e-commerce packaging, a barometer for industry and sector performance, grew 11.7 per cent in April, despite brick-and-mortar shops reopening in the same month. This followed a 35.6 per cent increase in demand in the year up [...]
Analysts warn Rishi Sunak: Treasury’s pensions raid could be ‘hugely risky’ June 21, 2021 The Treasury is eyeing pensions taxation as one way to pay for the cost of the pandemic, it was reported this morning. Although there are no plans to make changes to the triple lock, the Treasury is looking at three ways to change the ways in which pension contributions are taxed, which some analysts have [...]
Treasury planning ‘pensions raid’ to pay for pandemic costs June 21, 2021 The Treasury is looking at pensions taxation as one way to pay for the cost of the pandemic, although there are no plans to make changes to the triple lock. The Treasury is looking at three ways to change the ways in which pension contributions are taxed, the Telegraph first reported. Government is reportedly looking [...]
Sunak says pensions triple lock remains government policy as he faces £4bn bill June 17, 2021 Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said the triple lock on pensions remains government policy after it emerged that he may have to spend £4bn more on pensioners from next year if he sticks to the pledge. Sunak was grilled on the issue in an interview with GB News, after ONS data published earlier in the week [...]
General Electric to freeze $14bn pension pot for 2,700 UK staff June 10, 2021 General Electric Co will freeze pension benefits for around 2,700 UK employees from January 2022 and take a related charge, the company announced today. GE’s pension benefit obligation in the UK was about $14bn at the end of 2020. GE’s pension plan has been closed to new entrants in the UK since September 2011. At [...]
A third of gig economy couriers and delivery drivers have no savings June 9, 2021 Around 30 per cent of gig economy drivers, riders and couriers across Europe had no savings in the first half of 2021. Almost half of the 10,000 workers surveyed had experienced a claimable event such as an accident. Of these, only 12 per cent had actually made a claim and 69 per cent had a [...]
BlackRock takes over £21bn of BA pension scheme assets June 2, 2021 British Airways has handed the management of £21bn worth of pension assets to Blackrock in a bespoke deal between the airline and the asset manager. The agreement encompasses the assets directly under management for BA’s Airways Pension Scheme (APS) and New Airways Pension Scheme (NAPS), which serve 85,000 members and until now have been managed [...]
Cash clueless: Nearly half of Brits don’t know what an overdraft or mortgage is May 24, 2021 A new study has found that more than one in four people in the UK don’t feel confident when it comes to handling their personal finances. The research, carried out by debt management company Lowell and shared with City A.M. this evening, found that just a third of people claim to feel “very confident” when handling [...]