Redundancy Tax Planning – Ian’s Story

I started working with AAB Wealth around mid 2016 when I elected to take voluntary redundancy from my employer. This also coincided with the option of early retirement after over 30 years with a major oil operator in Aberdeen.

The pension freedoms process had been introduced just the year before, and the possibility of transferring out of a final salary pension was very new at the time. So I wanted to gather as much professional advice as possible before making any decisions.

We shortlisted three different companies, but in the end, we picked AAB Wealth because we got on with them immediately. Unlike the other companies, they didn’t constantly phone us trying to get us to make decisions; they made it very clear that it was up to us to decide when we were ready to move through the stages of the advice provided.

In addition, I was also looking at starting my own subsea consultancy business and it was clear AAB Wealth could help with that as well.

The process 

I worked with Andrew Dines and we started by looking at the bigger picture and my family situation, which meant that I could actually look at how planning my finances would benefit everyone.

As well as identifying what we wanted to do overall, Andrew also asked our reasons for choosing that particular route and proposed alternative options to consider.

Having a sounding board like that to run ideas past was very helpful.

He took us through everything from retirement planning to redundancy tax planning to transferring the pension, rental property options, drafting Wills, putting in place Power of Attorneys and inheritance tax planning.

We also explored setting up a new company for my consultancy work.

The results

The thing we liked most was that AAB Wealth, having provided the knowledge of the risks and opportunities involved, used financial modelling to illustrate our future financial requirements. They were able to put our minds at rest and this gave us confidence in taking necessary decisions.

The fact that we have also been able to blend taking early retirement, manage a redundancy package, start a new company, complete overall tax planning, invest in rental property and look ahead to the future while understanding our financial requirements, using AAB Wealth as our adviser has worked out really well.

What I love most is the way AAB Wealth help you by coming up with other ideas. They’ll structure these for you so you can see how things would look. This helps you to see that your future is going to be financially secure, whichever scenario you choose.

Comprehensive, honest and challenging

What makes AAB Wealth different is that they are easy to get along with and very open.

Despite the personal approach, the firm also has the scale to put you in contact with other specialists who you can consult with for your individual needs. This means you can benefit from their connections and their network.

It’s also clear, that as a company they invest in people in a big way; and they live their brand to an individual level.

But ultimately, they’re always there: you can phone up and get advice any time, they are completely client focused.

Of course, all the companies we spoke to were technically qualified, however this was going to be a long-term relationship, so having a personal rapport with them from the start was very important.

Hindsight is always perfect, however I just wish we had sought this type of advice about 10 years before retirement, as advice at that time could have been even more beneficial in approaching some of these important decisions.

“AAB made it very clear that it was up to us to decide when we were ready to move through the stages of the advice provided, the risks involved and the overall transfer process.” – Ian