RE: [bapanews] Can anyone advise on UK state pension payments to Wise?

26 views
Skip to first unread message

keith millum

unread,
Feb 26, 2024, 9:45:24 PM2/26/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com

Hi good people, how informative is this site

 

It got me wondering if it would pay for me to have my frozen pension paid directly to Wise a company I have never heard of

so I went on their website and honestly didn’t know what to do to see if was possible

 

So is there someone who has experience in these things could just let me know how to contact these people without a phone call maybe by email and shed some light if it is possible to open an account and then draw my GBP in Australia or if I have the totally wrong idea of what they are all about

 

Muddled 80yo who is not completely tech blind

 

Regards

Keith

 

From: 'Richard Denton' via BAPA <bapa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, 27 February 2024 5:12 AM
To: bapa...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [bapanews] Can anyone advise on UK state pension lump sums please?

 

I used still use Wise right from the get go when they were named Transfer Wise. Excellent service.  No complaints whatsoever

Richard

Sent from my iPhone 13



On 26 Feb 2024, at 6:42 pm, 'Marianne' via BAPA <bapa...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

 Wise has a way better rate the XE and you can open an account to keep the money in and get a visa type card to spend in any country.

 

Marianne


Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPad

On Sunday, February 25, 2024, 6:41 pm, Mo Reardon <m...@sir.com.au> wrote:

Hi Mary,

Many thanks for that. I use Xe and their rates are excellent and far better than banks. The DWP claim that if they pay directly into an Australian bank account " you will benefit from competitive exchange rates based on bulk buying of currency". I plan to call DWP on Monday and ask them their current exchange rate then I can compare with the Xe rate but whether anyone there will know I somehow doubt.

Cheers Mo

 

From: bapa...@googlegroups.com [mailto:bapa...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of mary barber
Sent: Sunday, February 25, 2024 10:54 AM
To: bapa...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [bapanews] Can anyone advise on UK state pension lump sums please?

 

If this helps I get very little pension but they send it to my account with Xe & then organise  an exchange rate to send to bank in Australia. You can not keep money in Xe. You could email or ring them in Australia No charge & good rates better than banks

 

 

 

From: 'Gary Rees' via BAPA <bapa...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 24, 2024 8:43:02 PM
To: bapa...@googlegroups.com <bapa...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [bapanews] Can anyone advise on UK state pension lump sums please?

 

Mo,

 

Well that’s interesting, sorry to hear about the Cancer diagnosis, I hope you both get good treatment and crack on and beat it.

 

Good luck

 

Sent from my iPhone

 

On 24 Feb 2024, at 17:44, Mo Reardon <m...@sir.com.au> wrote:



Gary,

If you defer taking your pension after retirement age not only does it continue to be indexed but when you do commence your pension you have an option to take a lump sum of the deferred amount or an increased weekly pension. As we both have recently been diagnosed with cancer the lump sum seems a good choice.

Cheers Mo

 

From: 'Gary Rees' via BAPA [mailto:bapa...@googlegroups.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 24, 2024 6:57 PM
To: bapa...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [bapanews] Can anyone advise on UK state pension lump sums please?

 

Mo

 

Are you saying that you can claim a lump sum on the UK State pension, as that is news to me, can you clarify that please.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone

 

On 24 Feb 2024, at 15:41, Mo Reardon <m...@sir.com.au> wrote:



Hi All,

1. My husband and I are planning to take our lump sums of UK State pensions in July 2024 which we have deferred since 2011 and 2012 years. Do you know how to legally minimise ATO tax on these?  We can't add any more funds to our SMSF.

2. If DWP make International Payments direct to an OZ bank are made do you know how good the exchange rate is they use?

3. I know the regular pensions aren't taxed in UK, just in Australia but what about the Lump sums? If taxed in the UK at a higher rate than Australian tax would be can we get a tax refund?

4. Do Graduated Pensions count towards the UPP?

5. I made voluntary contributions from Australia of 13 years to make up my 17 years to the 30 and husband made 10. Is this likely to give a UPP calculation of more than the 8%?

6. Does requesting the lump sum taken in July 2024 be treated as earned since 2011 and 2012 give preferential tax treatment over just paying it as if earned in 2024-2025 with the revised stage 3 tax cuts? I don't believe we have entered a higher tax bracket than 19c  and most years taxable income < $37000 each. I realise this would be a very complex calculation though.

7. I believe if we haven't taken the 8% UPP we can apply 3 years   i.e. 24% to the lump sum if we take it as all taxable in 2025?

 

If you are unable to answer these questions please do you know good accountant who is knowledgeable about these things please?

Many thanks

Mo and Tony  Reardon

 

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/001a01da66a5%24d1d62400%2475826c00%24%40sir.com.au.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/88237299-5FE7-4637-9FCA-71F04A188CF9%40icloud.com.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/00b001da6704%246d3f3540%2447bd9fc0%24%40sir.com.au.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/A22E551A-5A4E-495D-A929-DDEC92C5C72F%40icloud.com.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/ME2P282MB0435D647D5EEB032F671B3F694542%40ME2P282MB0435.AUSP282.PROD.OUTLOOK.COM.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/016101da67ab%24cb285ea0%2461791be0%24%40sir.com.au.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/2037220481.291612.1708891483413%40mail.yahoo.com.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BAPA" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to bapanews+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/D51CD91A-A95A-4CED-8A7A-DA8C31FC848B%40me.com.

mary barber

unread,
Feb 26, 2024, 10:05:29 PM2/26/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com

Hi keith, hope this helps

I rang XE in Sydney & arranged  for pension to be paid into their Barclays bank in London  & then they notify me & it is transferred to my west pac  in SA. But you have to ring pension in UK to give them the BSB etc and other info because the will only do it over the phone. Plus they must put your ref. number or Xe don’t know whose money it is!!!

Easy to set up but I am not sure if I want to do it all again with wise will have to see what the differenc is in exchange rate if worth changing of very small pension every 3 months . Not like I get a lot.

 Just ring Xe Sydney  0282704500 set it up then ring UK 0011441912187777  try & get them early morning before they get busy GMT

Hope this helps andra

Chris Hill

unread,
Feb 26, 2024, 10:33:02 PM2/26/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
Have used Wise for exchange for a decade without any problems. Due to  worries about UK banks shutting expat accounts about 2yrs ago opened a bank account with them all via their app so I could get my pension  paid directly into a Wise account . They last sent a debit card to Thailand via DHL which costs me approx 27gbp but it avoids  bothering my brother in the UK. To date I still have my UK bank account so I have only routed some payments via Wise as a bank. No problems so far.  

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/PS2PR06MB330448947F76920549DDC99DBB592%40PS2PR06MB3304.apcprd06.prod.outlook.com.
Message has been deleted

Marcus Wigan

unread,
Feb 28, 2024, 3:03:39 AM2/28/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
I do t use Wise I use OFX (ozforex) 

However my small pensions from London Pension. Scottish teachers, and National insurance frozen pension  I use the bulk systems each of them use via CitiBank and other mass transfer banks that they all at last use

Once set up these have all been working faultlessly

I suffer from the civil service FSSU system and the life insurance company was perfectly willing to do the audit process required for it to work via ozfirex

None are very significant but cumulatively very helpful the simplicity and zero effort once getting the automated process to be used by all but one  of them has produced very effective and economic transfers directly to my australian bank via Citibank et al 

Their exchange rates are pretty competitive 

I keep a watching brief in all this of course as an 82 year old with a need to keep on top of all this!

One small point that might help some of you

As you may know you can decide to split your NI pension with your retired australian wife as I have

I had a look at how it is done and the relevant base is the year you do this partition but the interesting thing is that the year you do it uses that as the start year of the freeze fir her so my freeze base in 2001 but hers is 2013 when I did it

I don’t know if this still applies-I only noticed when reviewing my files!

Marcus Wigan
Melbourne australia

Every little helps so I thought I’d post this


Sent from my iPhone

On 27 Feb 2024, at 14:33, Chris Hill <christophe...@gmail.com> wrote:



Richard Denton

unread,
Feb 28, 2024, 7:30:03 PM2/28/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
Hello Marcus,
You raise a very interesting point. My wife passed away in June last year. I informed UK state pension people. Received a form letter of condolence and a request to pay back proportional payment of her last monthly pension amount (which I promptly did but miffed as the payment was processed as debt recovery - what debt??) Have had passing thoughts of returning to the UK for a while and of course getting the unfrozen full pension. I would have to resume residential status for 6 months (I guess) then tell them I am going back o/seas. (Have been invited by an old friend to try Sun CIty retirement complex Arizona) If it tv didn’t work out I would sell up and go to Australia. Would it be worth all this palaver to get my full UK pension rights reset back in Australia. A foot note… most of my working life was spent overseas in many countries. I made monthly voluntary payments into the state pension and credited with 40+ years of contributions. Nobody nobody ever told me the pension would be frozen! Perfidious Albion.
Richard

Sent from my iPhone 13

On 28 Feb 2024, at 7:03 pm, Marcus Wigan <mwi...@gmail.com> wrote:

I do t use Wise I use OFX (ozforex) 

Sheila Telford

unread,
Feb 28, 2024, 9:47:38 PM2/28/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
I don’t often intervene on this site, but please be aware that your British pension would be frozen if you are just a visitor to the USA. You would need to seek full residency and become resident for tax purposes to then get an indexed UK state pension.Please check this status with DWP before making any life changing decisions. The USA and Bermuda are the two places where frozen pensioners cannot get an uplift while visiting, unlike other unfrozen countries.
> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/F222399B-EFFD-44A6-BA9D-7930BA2D3768%40me.com.

mary barber

unread,
Feb 28, 2024, 10:27:52 PM2/28/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
Do you have a visa for Australia ? as on a retirement visa you are classed as a visitor can claim nothing
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/bapanews/56BC793D-8890-4466-A898-F0F658E22FA9%40pensionsjustice.org.

Bruce Englefield

unread,
Feb 29, 2024, 2:27:33 AM2/29/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
Hello all,

Yes, a very interesting point.
If one was to return to the UK and take up residence there for more than six months would this reset one’s pension on a permanent basis. Thus, if after residing there as a resident, one returned to Australia and took up residence again, would the pension be frozen at the reset amount or return to the original frozen amount? 
Bruce.

Sent from my iPad

On 29 Feb 2024, at 11:30, 'Richard Denton' via BAPA <bapa...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Hello Marcus,

Lesley and Bob Maxwell

unread,
Feb 29, 2024, 2:28:28 AM2/29/24
to bapa...@googlegroups.com
Richard:
I suspect if you returned to Australia your pension would decrease to your current frozen level.......don’t quote me on that but I’m sure I read about a similar situation some while ago.
Regards Lesley 

Sent from my iPad
Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages