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Financial advice
I am about to receive an Irish pension consisting of a lump sum and then a fortnightly payment. I am also working in Belgium.
I am in need of advice on two things
(a) ensuring I pay tax correctly
(b) investment of lump sum (less than 100k)
I would be grateful for advice on the issue or ideas on where to receive financial advice. I have an ING bank account and I would like your thoughts also on whether advice from the bank is likely to be too biased.
Names of independent registered financial advisers welcome.
Thanks
For your tax, by far the easiest, and probably the best advice you can get is direct from the horses mouth, i.e. your local tax office. You can usually make an appointment and go and see them, or some also have "walk-in" sessions where you just go with no appointment.
For your "investment", my advice to you would be as follows:
1) absolutely do not feel rushed to do anything. Worst case scenario is that the cash sits in your bank, and you'll earn a tiny amount of interest. That's better than making a rush investment and losing your money.
2) If your existing employer has a pension scheme, it is possible that the best investment you could make would be to add (some or all) of your cash to that existing pot. In fact - it may make sense to go and see the pension provider anyway, just to discuss your situation. They may have solutions.
3) read advice on financial advisers made here:
http://www.xpats.com/decent-financial-advisers-expats
and here:
http://www.xpats.com/financial-investment
4) It's probably the most amount of cash you'll have at any one time in your lifetime. Make a small investment of money and time to buy a couple of simple book on investing, and then use the time to read them. Even if it takes you 6 months to do that at least you'll have a slightly better understanding of what to expect when you eventually do go and see and speak to your various financial advisors. In the meantime, your money is safe in the bank.
Remember also that you can probably do everything that a financial advisor will recommend, but at lower cost and lower risk yourself. In reality, investing is not complicated. You can open an online account at keytrade here in Belgium, or even Davyselect in Ireland
I'm not an accountant, banker or financial adviser, but I have worked in the financial services industry for 30 years.
I would listen to the ideas of your bank over those of "independent" financial advisors any time - these people who hang around expat pubs punting for business. It is not really in the bank's interests to scam you, and ING always give conservative advice (probably the other ones also). They offer the full range of financial products, not just their own and probably wider than a financial advisor would be able to.
The Irish government will deduct the tax at source.
You must declare you "foreign income" on your Belgian tax statment.
