Now you’re past the decade of the firsts, your 20s, you’re probably more settled and have an idea of how you want to live your life and what your priorities are for the foreseeable future.

In your 30s, you’ve probably changed a couple of jobs and moved up the career ladder but you also probably have a family to care for, childcare costs to pay, holidays to fund and many more financial demands to meet. This, understandably, may see your money stretched and may make you look at where you could cut back on your spending. And, even though a temporary pause on your pension payments may look like a good way to give your bank account a bit of a breather, it’s important you think long and hard before you make the decision.

Here’s why staying focused on your retirement goal and trusting your saving journey even in a time of a significant financial strain is the best thing you can do for your and for your loved ones’ future.

You’re not saving alone

One of the most valuable benefits of saving for the future with the British Transport Police Force Superannuation Fund (BTPFSF) is the fact that you’re not saving alone. Your employer puts money in too. If you’re a Defined Benefit member, your employer will pay in at least 60% of the money you put in (normally 1.5 times the contribution you make). For example, if you earn £25,000 a year and you pay in £3,000 towards your pension, your employer will top that amount up by £4,500 for free.

What is more, you get free money from the government too for saving into a workplace pension. The support comes in the form of tax relief on your pension contributions. The money you pay in is taken from your salary before you pay any tax on it, which helps you save more towards your pension. So, if you are a basic rate taxpayer and want to save £100 into your pension, because of the way tax relief works it will actually only cost you £80. The other £20 comes from the tax relief.

So, it’s important you think carefully before making any decisions about reducing or stopping your pension payments as this means you’ll lose a fair amount of money.

Will your State Pension be enough to give you a good life in retirement?

As much as we’d like to think of retirement as the golden time of our lives when for once we don’t have to worry about work and have the freedom to travel, take up new hobbies and enjoy life, we know that in reality the lifestyle we have in later life will largely depend on what income or savings we have. If you are only relying on the State Pension, will this give you the lifestyle you want at retirement? It’s great we have it, but the current State Pension is around  £10,000 a year, will that be enough? That’s around £10,000 less than what you would get paid if you were working 40 hours a week on the National Minimum Wage. And, based on current legislation it won’t be available until your late 60s.

But still if we play our cards right now and save towards our future while we are in work, we are much more likely to have the retirement we hope for.

Don’t interrupt the art of compounding

Your pension gets invested to give you an income when your working days are over. And the longer you keep it invested, the more chance it has to grow. Sometimes, it’d benefit not only from investment growth, but further growth on it too. This process is known as compounding and we explain it in more detail our ‘Pension planning in your 20s’ article.

Interrupting the investment process by stopping your pension payments would throw a massive spanner in the works. This is because it would affect the compounding that happens while you’re regularly investing into your pension. This on its turn means that you could potentially miss out on significant sums of money in the long run – after 20, 30 years.

The compounding effect only applies to members who have some or all of their pension money invested such as members of the Industry-Wide Defined Contribution (IWDC) section and members who pay in Additional Voluntary Contributions (AVCs) such as BRASS and AVC Extra. Compounding has no impact on Defined Benefit (DB) only members but if you stop paying into your DB pension that will impact what you have to live on when your working days are over. What is more, you may not be able to re-join the DB section in the future.

Once you’ve stopped paying in, you may not start again

Humans are creatures of habit and routine. It can be hard to go back to saving after you’ve had a flavour of having that extra bit of money in your pocket every month.

And as pointed above, if you leave the Fund, you may not be able to re-join again.

Think of your pension as one of your last options not your first when looking at where you can cut costs. To help our members think about their broader financial wellness we have introduced a simple planning tool called Moneyfit which you can access when you log into your myFund account.

Moneyfit is designed to give you some simple hints and tips to help you manage your money. It’s totally anonymous, and takes around 5-10 minutes to use.

Have a plan! If you don’t have one, make one!

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail as the saying goes. The same goes for retirement planning.

Even if you’re not left with any other option but to cut back on your pension saving this may not mean leaving the Scheme completely but pausing your Additional Voluntary Contributions (AVCs) for a little while.

So as an example you may choose to pause your £50 monthly additional contributions for a while. This might be a good option for you if it means you can stay in the Fund and can continue to save towards your pension. Or if you feel you have to leave pension saving behind for the time being, it’s always worth getting back to it when you’re more financially stable and can afford to save for later life.

The important thing is that you plan ahead, understand what you might need in retirement and ensure you are saving enough, without putting your broader financial wellness at risk.

Leaving the Scheme rather than pausing any extra payments you’re currently making could significantly impact your lifestyle in the future. It means you’ll have less to live on when your working days are over. For some, this also means they won’t be able to afford to retire when they want to and will be pushed to continue to work for longer.

To get an idea of how much income you might need to enjoy the lifestyle you hope for, give our  Retirement Budgeting Calculator a go. It’s a quick and easy tool to help you estimate if you’re saving enough for later life.