Overseas pension transfers and the advice requirement

The government has been made aware that the advice requirement may create difficulties for members who are resident overseas and wish to transfer safeguarded pension benefits to an overseas scheme.

The advice requirement means that members with safeguarded benefits of over £30,000 must take advice from an independent financial adviser authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

This call for evidence seeks views on:

• how members with safeguarded pension benefits transfer their pensions overseas
• how this has been affected by the introduction of the advice requirement
• whether an alternative safeguard could be developed that would give this group a comparable degree of protection to that provided by advice from an FCA authorised adviser