Earning
Negotiating when you cannot afford to walk away
Standard negotiating advice assumes an alternative. Once a household depends on the income, the leverage looks different and is not…
Ilse Vandenberg
Pensions writer, Money After Thirty
Ilse writes about pensions and employer matching, and considers it the most ignored free money there is.
Contact Ilse through our contact page — mark your message for their attention and it will be passed on.
19 articles
Earning
Going part-time changes progression more than pay
The salary reduction is proportional and predictable. What happens to the trajectory usually is not.
Earning
The counter-offer rarely fixes what made you look
A matched salary addresses the number on the payslip and usually not the reason the search started.
Pensions
Starting a pension at thirty-eight rather than twenty-two
The lost years cannot be recovered directly. What can be changed is the contribution rate, the horizon and the date you stop.
Pensions
Consolidating old pensions, and when not to
Bringing everything into one place is simpler and occasionally destroys something valuable that cannot be recreated.
Pensions
Why the projection on your pension statement is not a promise
It is an illustration built on assumptions, several of which will be wrong. Knowing which ones tells you how to read it.
Pensions
The default fund and how long you have left
Most people never change it, which is usually fine. The one thing worth checking is whether its risk level matches your remaining…
Pensions
Career breaks, credits and state pension entitlement
In many countries state entitlement depends on contribution years, and time spent caring may or may not count automatically.
Pensions
A household has one retirement, not two
Couples routinely plan two separate pensions and then retire into a single shared budget. The gap between those two facts causes…
Pensions
Salary sacrifice and what else it touches
Redirecting salary into a pension can be efficient. It also lowers the figure other things are calculated from.
Pensions
Stopping work before you can draw a pension
Retiring at fifty-five and being able to access money at fifty-five are separate questions. The gap between them has to be funded…
Pensions
The pension form that can override your will
Many schemes pay death benefits at the trustees' discretion, guided by a nomination form. A stale form is a common and expensive…
Earning
Bonus-heavy pay when your outgoings are fixed
A package weighted toward variable pay changes what you can safely commit to, which is a different question from what you earn in a…
Earning
Working for an employer that may not exist in three years
When your salary, your pension contributions and possibly your savings all depend on one organisation, its survival stops being an…
Earning
The pay review you are not in the room for
Pay is decided in a meeting you do not attend, against a budget set before your case was written, by people working mostly from…
Pensions
What to look at on a pension statement, and what to ignore
The number printed largest is the least reliable thing on the page, and the useful information is usually further down in smaller…
Pensions
Three job moves and what happened to the employer match
Every change of employer resets the pension arrangement, and the contribution rate you end up on is usually whatever the new scheme…
Pensions
Contributing for a partner who is not earning
When one person steps back from paid work, the household keeps its income and quietly stops building one person's retirement.
Pensions
Twenty years out and five years out are different problems
The distance between now and the point you need the money changes what a setback means, and most people never adjust the question.