• March 28, 2024
 2017 sees £6.5bn withdrawn from pension savings

2017 sees £6.5bn withdrawn from pension savings

£6.5 billion was withdrawn by savers using the pension freedoms last year.

According to the latest data from HM Revenue & Customs, the figure is almost £1 billion higher than 2016’s withdrawn total of £5.7 billion.

The data encompasses “flexible payments” from pensions, covering the purchase of a flexible annuity, full or partial withdrawals as well as flexible drawdown.

The final quarter of 2017 saw just under 200,000 people take payments from their pension, at a value of around £1.5 billion. This is slightly less than the previous three months, with quarter 3 of 2017 seeing £1.59 billion withdrawn.

Since pension freedoms were introduced in 2015, around £15.7 billion has been taken out of pension savings.

Commenting on the HMRC data was Stephen Lowe. The group communications director at Just Group stated: Savers are enjoying the flexibility of being able to exercise greater choice about how to use their pension savings. More than £6.5bn was withdrawn last year, up 15 per cent from 2016, and there’s a school of thought that says that much money can’t be wrong.

“But the truth is we don’t know – the industry still has little idea whether these savings are being used sustainably.”

Georgia Owen

Georgia is the Senior Content Executive and will be your primary contact when submitting your latest news. While studying for an LLB at the University of Liverpool, Georgia gained experience working within retail, as well as social media management. She later went on to work for a local newspaper, before starting at Today’s Wills and Probate.