Personal pension and SIPP key features: Quilter and Moneybox

Quilter's personal pension is the Collective Retirement Account (CRA), and its key features set out who it suits, how payments and tax relief work, what you can invest in and how the money comes out.

The document describes the CRA as a registered personal pension and says the papers that go with it, including your personalised illustration, come from your financial adviser. If Quilter is on your shortlist, an FCA-authorised adviser can compare it with your other options once you have sent in the form on this page.

What is the Quilter personal pension, and who is it for?

The CRA is a money purchase (defined contribution) pension: you or others pay in, the money is invested in your choice of funds, and its value follows the assets held. It is provided by Quilter Life & Pensions Limited. The key features (print code QIP 18805/205, which says it reflects Quilter's reading of the law as at April 2026) say the account could suit a UK resident who wants to choose their own funds, is prepared to leave the money tied up, normally until at least 55 (rising to 57 in 2028), and wants to leave the rest invested while taking income. It adds a warning: "If you do not have a financial adviser and if you are not comfortable making investment decisions without professional advice, this account is unlikely to be the right one for you."

The same document lists who it may not suit: anyone wanting shares or commercial property held directly, or wanting a workplace scheme, since it "cannot be used as an auto-enrolment or qualifying workplace pension scheme". For the wider picture of what a personal pension is, see personal pension or SIPP and how a SIPP works.

How do contributions work, including from an employer or the self-employed?

Quilter's key features set the limit for your own payments at "up to 100% of these earnings in total to one or more registered pension schemes", where the earnings are UK earnings liable to income tax. Self-employment counts. Relief on your payments is capped by the annual allowance, which GOV.UK sets at £60,000 for the 2026/27 tax year (lower for some high earners). With no earnings you can "normally pay up to £3,600 a year including tax relief", as long as you are resident in the UK. Relatives and others can pay in for you, and so can your employer if you are employed.

Basic-rate relief is claimed for you: in Quilter's example, worked at the 20% basic rate it labels 2023/24, a gross £100 costs you £80 and Quilter claims the £20 from HMRC. Higher-rate and additional-rate taxpayers claim the extra through self-assessment. Employer payments and transfers in get no relief through the account. The wider rules are in how pension tax relief works and employer payments into a personal pension.

Regular payments go by Direct Debit only, monthly or annually, and lump sums by cheque or bank transfer. You can reduce or stop regular payments without penalty, subject to Quilter's minimum levels. Quilter also warns that once you draw taxable income from money purchase savings, the yearly amount you can pay into them may fall to £10,000 (the money purchase annual allowance).

What can you invest in, and what does it cost?

Quilter's key features describe access to over 3,000 unit trusts and OEICs from over 180 fund management groups, plus over 800 exchange traded funds, commodities and investment trusts, and an interest-paying cash account. Managed portfolios, run by Quilter, and discretionary managers are alternatives, and Quilter says it can only continue those services while your financial adviser remains appointed. If you choose or change assets without an adviser, the range may be limited to assets not classed as complex.

The key features do not print a charges table; they point to your personalised Key Features Illustration and to a document called Making the cost of investment clear, which come through the adviser. Two details are printed. "There is no Product Charge applied to any money held in cash within your CRA", because Quilter keeps part of the interest instead. And "Quilter does not currently make an administrative charge for switching unit trusts or OEICs", though Quilter reserves the right to introduce one and you may pay the fund managers' own charges. Buying or selling exchange traded funds or investment trusts carries a dealing charge. Compare against pension charges and fees.

Values can fall as well as rise, and you may get back less than you paid in; Quilter says the value is not guaranteed.

How and when can the money come out?

You can normally start taking income, including tax-free cash, from 55 (57 from 2028), even if still working. Quilter says the tax-free lump sum will typically be 25% of the fund. Flexi-access drawdown has no cap on the income. Of annuities, Quilter says: "Quilter does not provide annuities. You can buy an annuity from any provider you choose." Details are in drawdown and annuities.

On death the whole account can normally provide a lump sum, flexi-access income or an annuity for beneficiaries; Quilter decides who, considering your expression of wish. See pension death benefits. You can move the account to another registered pension scheme at any time (how a transfer works), and you have 30 days to cancel after receiving the acceptance documents. If Quilter Life & Pensions could not meet its liabilities, the FSCS may arrange a transfer, a new account or compensation; for the CRA "the level of compensation you can receive from the scheme covers payment to 100% of the asset value with no upper limit." Cash in the account is treated differently: it shares any shortfall in the pooled bank account, and if that bank fails the trustee claims from the FSCS for up to £120,000 per member, per bank, a claim Quilter says is not guaranteed to succeed.

Where does Moneybox fit in?

Moneybox is a separate firm, and its personal pension is not a Quilter product: you open and manage it yourself, on desktop or in its app. On an archived copy of its pension page captured on 9 September 2026, Moneybox says you can open one "if you're a UK resident aged 18 or over with a National Insurance number", with tax relief on contributions stopping at 75. It can sit alongside a workplace pension, though Moneybox cannot take a transfer from a pension linked to your current employer, and it names being self-employed without a workplace scheme as one reason to have a personal pension. Its fees vary with the funds you hold; they are set out, dated, in PensionBee against Moneybox, and the self-employed options in pensions for the self-employed.

Quilter pension: three quick answers

Is the Quilter pension a stakeholder pension?

No. Quilter says the CRA "is not a Stakeholder Pension Plan", because its minimum payment is higher and some charges are higher than the government stakeholder standards. See stakeholder pension charges.

Can the Quilter pension be my workplace pension?

Not the CRA: Quilter says it cannot serve as an auto-enrolment or qualifying workplace scheme, although an employer can still pay into one you hold. See the auto-enrolment rules for what an employer must use.

Will a Quilter pension suit someone self-employed?

Self-employed earnings count towards the 100% limit, so it is open to them. Whether an adviser-led set-up suits uneven income is a point to raise when the adviser calls back after you leave your details on the form here.