For anyone who has taken out Irish Life public sector AVCs (e.g. HSE/Gardai), perhaps through Cornmarket or Irish Life directly, they should take a look to see if they have signed up to a Consensus Individual Retirement Strategy. This "strategy" moves the AVC into a Capital Protection Fund as one gets nearer to retirement. The Capital Protection Fund would have a very high level of bonds to reduce volatility presumably. For individuals in the public sector the requirement for such risk reduction is not clear to me given the guaranteed nature of the public sector pension.
The benefit to Cornmarket is that an annual management fee of 1.5% is levied to the Capital Protection Fund where most of the other funds seem to charge 1%. Irish Life charge 1% fee on this fund and Cornmarket charge an additional 0.5%. My spouse has just moved her fund into the Consensus Fund which charges 1% AMC.
I'd therefore suggest that individuals with Cornmarket AVCs look at this point is they are near retirement. It is likely that such a decision to move into this Consensus Individual Retirement Strategy was made when the AVC was purchased many years ago. On a side issue my spouse stopped paying AVCs many years ago and bought back years for her training time. Much better value for money and no fees to reduce fund performance (as db scheme obviously).
The benefit to Cornmarket is that an annual management fee of 1.5% is levied to the Capital Protection Fund where most of the other funds seem to charge 1%. Irish Life charge 1% fee on this fund and Cornmarket charge an additional 0.5%. My spouse has just moved her fund into the Consensus Fund which charges 1% AMC.
I'd therefore suggest that individuals with Cornmarket AVCs look at this point is they are near retirement. It is likely that such a decision to move into this Consensus Individual Retirement Strategy was made when the AVC was purchased many years ago. On a side issue my spouse stopped paying AVCs many years ago and bought back years for her training time. Much better value for money and no fees to reduce fund performance (as db scheme obviously).