Pension input periods.

A pension input period is used by Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC) to determine in which tax year your contributions are treated for tax purposes.

The scheme pension input period for the following Legal & General pension plans is 6 April to 5 April and has run from 6 April 2006.

• Legal & General Personal Pension Scheme No. 1
• Legal & General Self Invested Personal Pension
• Legal & General Portfolio Plus Self Invested Personal Pension (including Portfolio Plus Pension)
• Legal & General Self Invested Personal Pension 2000
• Legal & General Self Invested Personal Pension No. 1
• Legal & General Personal Pension 2000 Plan
• Legal & General Stakeholder Pension
• Legal & General Stakeholder Pension Established in 2008
• Legal & General Pension Savings Plan
• Legal & General (UTM) Stakeholder Pension Scheme
• Legal & General Nationwide Life Personal Pension Scheme
• Legal & General WorkSave Pension Plan

You may have joined one of the above schemes as an individual or as part of a group arrangement arranged by your employer.

For older pension schemes such as Personal Investment Plan, Pension Retirement Plan and Self-Employed Pension Plan, the pension input period will be based on the date of the first contribution received after 5 April 2006.

If you’re a member of a Legal & General pension scheme that is not listed above, the scheme pension input period will have been set by the scheme trustee not us – please contact your employer if you require this information.

If you have pension plans with other providers, you could have a different pension input period for those schemes.

WHAT IS A PENSION INPUT PERIOD?

A pension input period is the period over which you measure the amount of your pension saving (pension input) for your pension plans.

The Annual Allowance for a tax year is tested against pension savings made during the pension input period ending in that tax year.

WHAT IS THE ANNUAL ALLOWANCE?

The Annual Allowance for the tax year 2012/2013 is £50,000. It takes into account gross contributions paid by you and any contributions paid by your employer or third parties into any registered pension scheme. In the case of final salary schemes, contribution is defined as the increase in the value of benefits for active members.

If the total contributions to all of your pensions add up to more than the Annual Allowance for that tax year or pension input period, you will have to pay a tax charge on the amount paid above the Annual Allowance.

The Annual Allowance will not apply in the tax year in which you die or if you take your benefits on the grounds of serious ill health.

Where the total of the contributions to all of your registered pension schemes exceeds the Annual Allowance in a given tax year or pension input period, unused allowances from up to three previous tax years may be available. The Annual Allowance for each of the three tax years before the tax year 2012/2013 is assumed to be £50,000 for this purpose. To be able to do this you must have been a member of a registered pension scheme in the tax year(s) from which you wish to make use of any unused allowance. If you think this may affect you please contact your financial adviser. 

CAN I CHOOSE MY OWN PENSION INPUT PERIOD?

Yes, you can choose your own pension input period. If a pension input period ends earlier than an anniversary of the end of the previous pension input period, the next pension input period must end in the following tax year.

You must tell us if you wish to elect your own pension input period.

What if I have previously nominated a pension input period?

Your personally selected pension input period will be used.

If I already use the tax year for my tax return, what should I do?

As the pension input period is based on the tax year you don’t need to do anything.

I have been using the anniversary of my first contribution following 6 April 2006 for my tax return, what should I do?

You should contact HMRC and ask for your tax returns to be retrospectively adjusted.

You will be liable to any Annual Allowance charge that arises as a result of the change in the pension input period. You will be able to reclaim any overpaid tax that may arise as a result of the change. A repayment claim can be made up to four years after the end of the tax year in which the over payment arose.

For more information on pension input periods please see HM Revenue & Customs pensions website.