Enjoy Finance

A major pension provider has come under fire for levying a 10 per cent fee?on policyholders who try to boost their pension funds near retirement.

Leona Helmsley, the New York hotel tycoon, is one of a line of wealthy, eccentric types who have opted to structure their wills creatively and set aside substantial sums to provide for their pets.

Members of company pension schemes are leading an “exodus” of funds into self-invested personal pensions (Sipps), as more employers close their defined-benefit, or “final-salary”, schemes to new members. But employees are being warned to check the terms of their transfers, and the type of Sipp they use.