You’d be surprised at how many we meet who’ve never ‘got around’ to getting married, sometimes after many, many years of being together. Or those of fewer years, but with children, often both joint and previous. Being married can both complicate and decomplicate matters, of course, and money should never be the reason to do the deed. But you need to plan accordingly. You should always have wills, and wills which are up to date, as ‘common law’ usually protects no-one. Life cover should be in place and in trust if there are kids involved. And you should be aware, at least, that if Inheritance Tax is a concern, getting married, even at the last minute, can be an effective tax-planning strategy. As with many things, the real world moves far more quickly than that of the rule makers.
“HMRC scraps plans to tax pensions after death”
A couple of other Statement Highlights (in my world, anyway). A welcome ‘nothing happened’ on the treatment of pensions on death. They were never going to be liable to IHT (too complicated with trusts and trust law) but there was talk of making them income-taxable on the recipients at whatever age you die.
