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My Scheme investments
The contributions to your personal account are invested to help them grow. Deciding how to invest them is important, because the growth of your investments ultimately affects how much money you will have at retirement.
Default investment option
If you don’t make a decision about how to invest your contributions, your personal account will be invested using the Drawdown Lifestyle strategy.
Your choices
This might be the first time you’ve had to think about investments. Whether you’re an experienced investor or completely new to making investment choices, the Scheme has options to suit everyone.
Depending on how involved you want to be in choosing and managing your investments, the Scheme provides you with a ‘hands-on’ approach, where you select your own investments (self-select), or a ‘hands-off’ approach where you choose one of the automatic lifestyle strategies. Our investment guide provides more details, but we've provided an overview of your options below.
Lifestyle options
A lifestyle strategy is when your investments are managed for you. At the beginning of your retirement saving, your money is automatically invested for growth (the growth phase). Then, as you get closer to your retirement age, some of your money is gradually and automatically moved into less risky investments (the transition phase).
The Scheme offers you three lifestyle strategies which have been designed to fit with your own attitude to investment risk as well as how you would like to use your personal account at retirement.
- Drawdown Lifestyle strategy – this is for you if you think you’ll keep your account invested after you retire and take sums of money from it.
- Annuity Purchase Lifestyle strategy – this is for you if you plan to buy an annuity (an insurance product which provides a guaranteed income in exchange for a lump sum payment).
- Cash Lifestyle strategy – this is for you if you think you’ll cash in your personal account and not take a retirement income at all.
Self-select funds
The Scheme offers a range of 12 self-select funds from which you can choose your own investments, if you prefer a more ‘hands-on’ approach. In doing so, you’ll need to make sure you have the time to review them regularly and that you’re comfortable making the investment decisions involved in managing your own account.
Unlike the Lifestyle strategies, if you choose to select your own funds, your money doesn’t automatically move into less risky investments as you approach your retirement date. You’ll need to manage this process yourself.
The self-select fund range
Equity funds
Diversified funds
Property funds
Bonds
Cash funds
You can manage your investments at any time by logging into your personal account via My Work Pension.