MEMBER ZONE


DIVIDING PENSIONS DURING A DIVORCE


Tony Byrne, (pictured) managing director of Wealth and Tax Management, discusses the tax traps on pensions on divorce.


In the last issue of this publication, I explained how the Lifetime Allowance tax charge applies to pensions, and the enormous complexity it entails. Sadly, if you get divorced the complexity gets even worse! You see, on divorce there are three ways of sharing your pensions: 1. Offset. 2. Earmarking order. 3. Pension sharing order. Earmarking orders are rarely, if ever,


used these days. Offsetting is the practice of dividing


up the matrimonial assets on divorce. So, for example, a wife may prefer to keep the house and her husband his pension. The value of each asset is offset to create a division of assets in line with the agreed split, for example 60:40. Pension sharing orders are now


commonplace. Once it has been agreed


to split the pension on divorce the court will award a pension sharing order in favour of one spouse against the other. The spouse whose pension is being shared will suffer a debit and the credit will be awarded to the other spouse. The complication is that certain protections will be lost or reduced on divorce, and the problem is that the potential loss of protection can be huge especially where a spouse has a particularly large pension. If you are fortunate enough to have a


large pension and unfortunate enough to get divorced, do make sure that you get expert pensions advice on divorce from a qualified, experienced, pensions on divorce specialist.


Visit: www.wealthandtaxmanagement.co.uk


AWARD-WINNING BUSINESS BROADBAND WITH GLIDE This award is given not just for excellent connectivity - but to the


In one of the first awards events of the season, Chamber members, Glide, recently walked away with the award for ‘Best Infrastructure’ at the 2020 Estates Gazette Tech Awards. Glide’s national network provides 1500km of uncontended


fibre to c.100,000 addressable premises on large, underserved business parks across the country. As one of the very few ISPs physically laying their own


fibre on their own national 100Gbit/s core network, Glide’s CEO Tim Pilcher said: “We are very proud of our network and the benefits it brings to our customers - and we are delighted to have its excellence recognised by Estates Gazette.” It’s not just Glide’s infrastructure that wins awards - it’s


their whole package -which is why Glide was awarded SME Service Provider of the Year at this year’s Connected Britain awards.


‘WE ARE VERY PROUD OF OUR NETWORK AND THE BENEFITS IT BRINGS’


company that best meets the needs of the business customer with a wider portfolio of ICT products. Tim continued: “It’s reflective of our broadband not just being faster and more reliable, but our focus on enabling businesses to harness a range of technology more effectively to ensure they’re ready for the challenges of their industry.” According to Connected Britain’s judges: “By


providing ultrafast broadband to almost 1,200 businesses in some of the country’s most difficult-to- reach SMEs, Glide was the clear forerunner in this


category, helping to keep businesses competitive wherever they are situated.”


Visit: www.glidebusiness.co.uk/business DECEMBER 2020/JANUARY 2021 inbusiness 25


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