The national free debt solution provider has seen a significant rise in calls from people aged 55 and over in the last quarter with pension debt worries. Payplan believes that advisers have a crucial role to play in warning people shortly facing retirement to take stock of their situation and seek advice to plan ahead to avoid the spectre of debt in retirement.
John Fairhurst, managing director at Payplan, commented, “The over 50s are our fastest growing age group and have the biggest debts according to our latest figures.
“This immediately throws up a red alert for us – high levels of personal debt coupled with a lower than expected retirement income is a potential recipe for long term hardship. It is vital that advisers encourage older clients to factor debt repayment into their retirement strategy.”
He added “The concerns over government changes to pension income has started to worry retirees who have already been seriously hit by a final salary pensions fund which has fallen drastically below their expected return. The situation is worse for 200,000 UK pensioners living in private retirement property, who, according to AgeUK, are being burdened with spiralling service charges and unfair fees.”
