Members Planning your retirement
We’re here to help you plan for the type of retirement you want. Use our retirement checklist to help you make a plan, or check any plans you’ve already made.
It’s easy to find out how much you’ve got in your now:pensions account.
Log in to now:u. Your Snapshot shows the current value of your pension savings.
If you’ve got pension savings with other employers or personal pensions, you should get a statement each year showing:
- the value of your current savings, and
- how much your pension could be at your planned retirement age.
If you think you’ve got an old pension but have lost the details, you can use the government’s Pension Tracing service to find it.
You can use the government’s State Pension forecast service to get an estimate of your State Pension.
Step 2: Check how much you’ll need
In now:u we’ve designed an interactive retirement planner to help you understand what your pension savings could be worth when you retire, and what you can do with your pension savings.
In the planner you can:
- increase how much you pay in to your pension savings – or decrease it, if you’re currently paying more than the minimum
- change your planned retirement age to be earlier or later, as long as it’s at least 55 – the current minimum retirement age
- add in the value of any other pensions and savings you’ve got elsewhere
- see what impact a career break could have on your pension
- understand the effect if you change the number of hours or days you work in future.
The retirement planner will work out new estimates of your future pension savings, depending on what you’ve put in.
To use the planner, log in to now:u and go to Plan your retirement.
To get an idea of how much you’ll need to save for your retirement, have a look at the Retirement Living Standards developed by The Pension and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA). They’re only guidelines, but they’re designed to be a good place to start.
Step 3: Review your retirement plans and options
Choosing your planned retirement age
Your planned retirement age is the age you want to start taking your pension savings. We assume it’s your State Pension age unless you’ve told us something else.
By law, you must have reached the minimum pension age to start taking your pension savings. This is currently 55 and will go up to 57 from April 2028.
Remember to check the planned retirement ages for any other pensions you’ve got (your other pension providers should be able to help) and think about when you may want to take those savings.
Putting in more
The more you save, the more income you’ll have. Are you saving as much as you can afford?
You can pay more money into your pension savings each month to build up more pension savings.
Combining your pensions
Could you combine your pension savings to make them easier to manage?
Transfer other pensions into your now:pensions account, or out to another pension.
Either way, we don’t charge you to transfer.
Reviewing your retirement options
Choosing the right retirement option is a very important decision. Learn about all your retirement options so you can see which ones might suit you best.
Step 4: Log in to now:u
If you decide you want to take your pension savings as cash, log in to now:u and follow the instructions.
- Choose Retirement to go to the Taking your pension savings page.
- Under Take cash, select Choose this option.
- Follow the onscreen instructions.
Go to the question below to find out more.
Firstly – you usually need to be at least 55 (57 from 6 April 2028).
You may be able to take your pension savings earlier if you’re suffering from ill health.
Read our guide to learn more on how to take your pension savings.
Finding help and guidance
Like any other pension provider, we can’t tell you what to do with your pension savings.
The Pension Wise service offers free guidance about your options for retirement. You can chat to pension experts on the website.
If you’re over 50 you can make an appointment for guidance. This can either be a call with a pension expert, or a self-guided appointment online.
Calls last about an hour.
The self-guided appointment is expected to last about 30 minutes, but you can save it at any time and come back to it later.
- Book a Pension Wise appointment online.
- Book your appointment by phone on 0800 138 3944.
- Or, we can book your Pension Wise appointment for you. Contact us,
Regulated financial advice
Pension Wise offers guidance. It doesn’t give specific advice, tailored to you, recommending what you should do. You can only get this kind of advice from an adviser who’s regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). You usually have to pay for regulated financial advice and it can seem expensive, but it could be money well spent if it gives you a better retirement.
The government-backed MoneyHelper website has a guide to choosing a financial adviser and a directory of advisers who can give regulated financial advice about pensions.
The Personal Finance Society (PFS) has a What we do for the public section, including a directory you can filter to find advisers that specialise in giving regulated financial advice about retirement planning.
The FCA has a register of financial services firms regulated in the UK. You should check any adviser you’re thinking of using appears on this register as authorised to give advice about pensions.
Get help with our guides
Frequently asked questions
See all support for membersYou don’t have to retire to start taking your money out of now:pensions. At the moment you can start taking it once you’re 55. This age goes up to 57 in 2028.
You do have a planned retirement age in now:pensions. We assume it’s your State Pension age if you haven’t told us anything different. Check your State Pension age now.
This is important because your planned retirement age affects how your money is invested as you get closer to retiring. If we don’t use the right age, your investments won’t work in the way they should. You could miss out on some retirement income.
To check or change your planned retirement age, log in to now:u and go to Investments > Personalise your plan. On the Choose your plan page, choose See details.
Below the details of the charges you’ll see your current planned retirement age. Use the plus or minus signs to change the age to the one you want.
Firstly – you usually need to be at least 55 (57 from 6 April 2028).
You may be able to take your pension savings earlier if you’re suffering from ill health.
Read our guide to learn more on how to take your pension savings.
The earlier, the better. It’s never too early.
- The more you plan, the more likely you are to get the kind of retirement you want.
- And the longer your pension savings have to build up, the more money you’re likely to have when you retire.
Read more about planning your retirement here.
With now:u, you can plan your retirement whenever you want. now:u always shows the projected value of your pension savings at your planned retirement age.
Log in to now:u and go to Plan your retirement. You can play around with our retirement planner to see how paying more in to your pension savings or changing your planned retirement age changes the projected value of your pension savings.
You can also use the planner to see how long your money is likely to last after you retire.
MoneyHelper and Pension Wise
The government-backed MoneyHelper service offers free, impartial guidance about a whole range of money matters including budgeting, money troubles, savings and pensions. Trained experts are available to help by phone and webchat.
MoneyHelper includes Pension Wise, a service for people over 50 that explains your options for taking money out of your pension savings. You can chat to pension experts on the website.
If you’re over 50 you can make an appointment for a guidance call. This can either be a call with a pensions expert, or a self-guided appointment online.
Calls last about an hour.
The self-guided appointment is expected to last about 30 minutes, but you can save it at any time and come back to it later.
- Book a Pension Wise appointment online.
- Book your appointment by phone on 0800 138 3944.
- Or, we can book your Pension Wise appointment for you. Contact us.
Citizens Advice
Citizens Advice is a charity offering confidential help and advice to help people sort out their problems, including money and debt.
Regulated financial advice
The organisations we’ve listed so far offer guidance. They don’t give specific advice, tailored to you, recommending what you should do. You can only get this kind of advice from an adviser who’s regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). You usually have to pay for regulated financial advice and it can seem expensive, but it could be money well spent if it gives you a better retirement.
The MoneyHelper website has a guide to choosing a financial adviser and a directory of advisers who can give regulated financial advice about pensions.
The Personal Finance Society (PFS) has a What we do for the public section, including a directory you can filter to find advisers that specialise in giving regulated financial advice about retirement planning.
The FCA has a register of financial services firms regulated in the UK. You should check any adviser you’re thinking of using appears on this register as authorised to give advice on pensions.