If you are reading this, there is a good chance you built up pension savings in the UK through an Aegon SIPP or a workplace pension, and then your life took you somewhere else. You moved to the United States, to Europe, to the Middle East, to Australia, or to Canada. The Aegon pot stayed behind, quietly sitting on a platform that was designed around UK residents. An Aegon SIPP transfer is now one of the most frequent reviews I carry out for clients living overseas, and for good reason.
This guide is written for people in exactly that position. It explains what Aegon does well, where the platform begins to struggle for non-UK residents, why the beneficiary drawdown issue is the single most important planning risk most people have never heard of, and what your realistic transfer options look like in 2026. It is written to be read by a non-specialist, without jargon and without sales pressure.
| Key Point for Non-UK Residents Aegon’s own Death Benefits Guide for the Aegon SIPP states that beneficiaries must be UK residents to qualify for beneficiary drawdown. Where a beneficiary is not a UK resident, Aegon may only be able to offer a lump sum. For many families living abroad, this is a critical planning risk that is entirely avoidable with the right advice. |
What Is the Aegon SIPP and Who Uses It?
The Aegon SIPP is a self-invested personal pension provided by Scottish Equitable plc, a subsidiary of Aegon UK plc. It is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Aegon also operates two related platforms, Aegon Retirement Choices (ARC) and One Retirement, both of which share similar product structures and similar limitations for overseas members.
Aegon is one of the largest pension providers in the UK. The group serves more than four million customers and powers workplace pension schemes for over nine thousand employers. If you were employed in the UK in the last fifteen years, there is a reasonable probability that at least part of your pension history sits with Aegon today, even if you no longer live or work in the UK.
The typical client who approaches me about an Aegon SIPP transfer is a UK national now living abroad. They usually joined an employer’s Aegon group personal pension, left the UK, and simply retained the plan. Many have not reviewed it since. Others have only discovered the limitations of the platform when they started to think about drawing an income, updating their nominations, or planning how the pot will cascade to their family.
How Aegon Works for Non-UK Residents: The Core Limitations
Residency and New Business Restrictions
Aegon does not generally accept new SIPP applications from non-UK tax residents. If you are already a member, you may be permitted to retain the plan, but the platform was not designed to serve overseas clients on an ongoing basis. That design gap creates friction across several areas: contributions, investment choice, payments, tax reporting, and death benefits.
Cross-Border Payments and Currency
Aegon’s standard payment infrastructure is designed for UK bank accounts. Paying pension income directly to an overseas bank account in a foreign currency, together with the tax documentation needed to claim under a UK double taxation agreement, can be cumbersome and in some cases is not supported. For clients living in countries that have a UK DTA, the process of obtaining a no-tax or reduced-tax code from HMRC adds a further administrative layer, and most of that process lands on the member.
Investment Options and Currency Exposure
Many clients who join a workplace Aegon scheme are defaulted into a UK-centric fund panel chosen by their former employer. Once you leave the UK, that panel rarely reflects your currency needs, your risk appetite, or your long-term retirement location. Reviewing the underlying investment is often the single largest source of value in any Aegon SIPP transfer conversation, even before the structural issues are considered.
The Non-UK Beneficiary Problem: Why This Matters Most
This is the issue that most clearly separates a standard UK SIPP from an International SIPP, and it is one where Aegon’s own product documentation is unusually candid.
| What Aegon’s Death Benefits Guide Says Aegon’s published Death Benefits Guide for the Aegon SIPP states explicitly that beneficiaries must be UK residents for drawdown. Where the beneficiary is not a UK resident, Aegon may only be able to offer a lump sum. |
Under current UK pension rules, a nominated beneficiary who inherits an unused drawdown fund can elect for beneficiary drawdown. That is a powerful option. The money stays inside the pension wrapper, it continues to be invested, income can be drawn over time, and whatever is unused can be passed on again to the next generation. It is one of the most tax-efficient ways to move retirement wealth through a family.
For non-UK-resident beneficiaries, however, most UK SIPP providers do not hold the regulatory authorisations required to market their products into the relevant overseas jurisdiction. Aegon is no exception. The consequence is straightforward: if your spouse, partner, or adult children live outside the UK, they will typically not be offered the drawdown option. The only route available to them may be a lump sum encashment.
Why Forced Encashment Is a Problem
A lump sum payment of death benefits carries very different tax consequences from structured drawdown. Two scenarios illustrate the point.
- A large one-off payment may push the beneficiary into a higher income tax bracket in their country of residence in the year of receipt, producing a materially higher tax bill than a series of smaller annual drawdowns.
- Once the lump sum has left the pension, the ability to cascade what remains down to a second generation is lost entirely. The money no longer sits inside a pension wrapper, so it no longer benefits from the associated tax treatment.
An International SIPP is specifically designed to serve non-UK-resident clients and their beneficiaries. The trustees and administrators hold the appropriate cross-border authorisations through a connected locally regulated financial adviser. A non-UK-resident beneficiary can elect for beneficiary drawdown, keep the funds invested inside the pension wrapper, and continue to receive advice from a regulated professional in their own country. That is the outcome that sensible retirement planning should be structured to deliver.
Aegon SIPP Transfer Options: International SIPP or QROPS?
If your Aegon SIPP or Aegon workplace pension no longer serves your circumstances as a non-UK resident, two principal transfer routes are available. In the vast majority of cases, an International SIPP is the stronger fit. A QROPS suits a narrower set of circumstances.
International SIPP
An International SIPP is structurally identical to a standard UK SIPP. It is a registered pension scheme in the UK, listed with HMRC, and regulated by the FCA. The difference is that the platform, the trustee, and the administration are all built to serve non-UK-resident clients. That means payments to foreign bank accounts, multi-currency support, compatibility with local regulators, and, crucially, the ability to offer beneficiary drawdown to overseas family members.
The annual platform costs for International SIPPs are typically modest. In our experience they usually sit around 10 to 15 basis points above equivalent UK SIPP platforms, and several of the International SIPP providers Cameron James works with are competitive even on an absolute basis, including compared to well-known UK platforms.
QROPS
A QROPS is a pension scheme established outside the UK that meets HMRC’s conditions to be a Recognised Overseas Pension Scheme. A transfer to a QROPS moves your pension out of the UK tax framework entirely, which can be attractive in narrow circumstances, in particular where the member has been non-UK resident for five or more years and retirement is clearly planned outside the UK.
The decisive issue is the Overseas Transfer Charge, a 25 percent tax charge that applies to most QROPS transfers unless specific exclusions apply. Those exclusions have been tightened materially since the October 2024 Budget. For most non-UK residents, a transfer to a QROPS now triggers the Overseas Transfer Charge unless the member and the QROPS are resident in the same country, or one of the remaining narrow exemptions applies. That makes QROPS unsuitable for the majority of clients in most jurisdictions, and it pushes most people toward the International SIPP route.
Which Route Is Right for You?
International SIPP: suitable for the majority of non-UK residents in most jurisdictions. Your pension remains UK-registered, remains FCA-regulated, continues to benefit from the UK double taxation agreement framework for income withdrawals, and your beneficiaries retain access to drawdown regardless of where they live.
QROPS: a narrower category of cases where the member is permanently domiciled abroad, has been non-UK resident for five or more years, and is resident in the same country as the QROPS. Australia and Canada are common examples. Professional advice is essential before any QROPS transfer is initiated.
Transferring Out of Aegon: The Safeguarding Process
Since November 2021, UK pension legislation has required trustees and managers of registered schemes to carry out due diligence checks before processing transfer requests. The rules were introduced to protect members from pension fraud, and Aegon applies them to every transfer request.
Transfers are assessed under a traffic light system. Green transfers proceed without delay. Amber flag transfers, which include transfers involving overseas investments, International SIPP structures, or transfers involving overseas advisers, require the member to complete a free safeguarding guidance appointment with MoneyHelper, the government-backed guidance service. Once the appointment is completed, the member receives a unique reference number, which is provided to Aegon to release the transfer. Red flag transfers, typically those where the advising firm lacks the necessary regulatory permissions, are stopped.
Historically, Aegon applied particularly stringent scrutiny to transfers involving non-UK advisers, in some cases continuing to red-flag transfers even after the FCA clarified that the authorisation requirement did not extend to advisers regulated outside the UK. The MoneyHelper safeguarding process has resolved this for most clients, but it still adds delay and can produce frustration if the process is not navigated correctly.
| Avoiding Transfer Delays Cameron James advisers all hold individual FCA and EEA authorisation, and many hold SEC registration. That means our advice on your Aegon SIPP transfer is provided on a fully authorised basis in your jurisdiction, and we are positioned to support the entire transfer process, including any MoneyHelper safeguarding requirement. We have extensive practical experience navigating Aegon’s transfer procedures for non-UK residents. |
Aegon Workplace Pensions: Additional Considerations
Many of the clients I speak to hold an Aegon pension established through an employer’s group personal pension scheme, rather than a self-invested personal pension opened directly. The underlying platform is the same, but the investment options are usually more restricted, limited to the fund range selected by the employer at the time the scheme was established. Default funds and restricted panels can mean that a long-departed former employee is invested in a portfolio that no longer reflects current market options, currency requirements, or personal risk appetite.
Workplace GPP members also lose the benefit of employer contributions once they leave the employer. The only remaining value in continuing to hold the Aegon workplace pension is the platform itself, and for non-UK residents that platform’s limitations often outweigh its advantages.
The statutory transfer rights from an employer’s GPP are identical to those from a personal pension: members have the right to transfer to a registered pension scheme of their choice, subject to the safeguarding checks described above. Aegon does not impose a transfer-out penalty on the plan. Costs associated with a transfer relate to adviser fees and the setup and ongoing fees of the receiving arrangement.
What This Means for You
If you are holding an Aegon SIPP or Aegon workplace pension while living abroad, the most important thing to do is to carry out a structured review rather than assume the status quo is safe. For some clients, the conclusion will be to remain invested with Aegon. For many others, particularly those with non-UK-resident spouses or children, an Aegon SIPP transfer into an International SIPP will produce materially better long-term outcomes: lower friction on income withdrawals, investment options aligned with your currency and country of residence, and the ability to pass the pot down through beneficiary drawdown rather than through a forced encashment.
Your own position will depend on where you live, who your nominated beneficiaries are, how the underlying investments inside your Aegon plan are performing against your needs, and what your retirement timeline looks like. These factors interact. The value of independent, cross-border advice is to work through them in the right order and to document the reasoning, so that whatever you decide is a considered decision rather than an accident of inertia.
| JONATHAN LAWS | SENIOR IFA, CAMERON JAMES “Of all the UK platforms I review for clients living overseas, Aegon is one of the most common. It is a solid platform for UK residents, but for someone building a life in the United States, the Middle East, or Europe, it tends to look less and less like the right home for a long-term retirement pot. The detail that clients find most shocking when I walk them through it is the beneficiary drawdown position. Aegon’s own documentation is clear that if the person you have nominated does not live in the UK, the only payout available may be a lump sum. That single point can turn decades of careful saving into a forced, heavily taxed event at exactly the wrong moment. It is also entirely avoidable with the right planning.” |
How Cameron James Can Help
Cameron James is a cross-border financial planning firm. Our advisers hold individual FCA authorisation, SEC registration, and EU regulatory authorisations, and we specialise in UK, US, and international pension planning. We work with clients living across the United States, Europe, and the rest of the world.
A typical Aegon review and transfer engagement covers the following:
- A full review of your Aegon SIPP or workplace GPP, including current fund selection, charges, and investment suitability for your residency and currency needs.
- Assessment of whether a transfer is suitable in your circumstances, including any Aegon-specific product features that may be worth retaining.
- Suitability analysis across the International SIPP providers we work with, covering trustee quality, platform costs, investment range, payment flexibility, and overseas beneficiary support.
- Advice on the optimal transfer pathway for your tax position, including application of any UK double taxation agreement in your country of residence.
- Full management of the Aegon transfer process, including support with any MoneyHelper safeguarding appointment requirements.
- Death benefit planning, including nomination review and structuring so that your beneficiaries, wherever they live, have the drawdown options they need.
- Ongoing cross-border planning covering goals-based lifestyle financial planning, income drawdown, currency strategy, and tax reporting obligations in your country of residence.
If you are a United States resident, our advice is compliant with US securities law via Beacon Global Advisor Network, LLC. Our investment approach uses low-cost, globally diversified portfolios structured to work within the US-UK double taxation agreement framework.
| SPEAK TO A CAMERON JAMES ADVISER If you are living outside the UK and still hold an Aegon SIPP or Aegon workplace pension, you do not need to leave that decision sitting in your inbox for another year. A short, structured review will confirm whether staying put is the right answer, or whether a transfer to an International SIPP would serve you and your family better. Book a call with a Cameron James adviser |
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I keep my Aegon SIPP if I live outside the UK?
In most cases, yes. Existing members are generally permitted to remain in the plan after moving abroad. However, your ability to contribute meaningfully to the SIPP will be limited, and the platform’s ongoing suitability for your circumstances as a non-UK resident may be poor, particularly in relation to investment options, payment infrastructure, currency support, and death benefits. A review will confirm whether staying put or carrying out an Aegon SIPP transfer is the stronger answer for your situation.
What happens to my Aegon pension when I die if my family lives abroad?
This is the single most important question for non-UK-resident pension holders. Aegon’s Death Benefits Guide for the Aegon SIPP confirms that beneficiaries must be UK residents to qualify for beneficiary drawdown. If your nominated beneficiaries live outside the UK, Aegon may only be able to offer them a lump sum death benefit. That can produce a large, potentially heavily taxed payment that removes all future planning flexibility. An International SIPP is specifically structured to avoid this outcome.
Is there a transfer-out charge on an Aegon SIPP or Aegon workplace pension?
Aegon does not impose a transfer-out charge on its SIPP or workplace group personal pension products. You may incur dealing costs when liquidating existing fund positions, and your receiving provider will charge its own setup and ongoing fees. Your adviser will also charge for the advice and for managing the transfer. There are no Aegon-specific penalties for leaving the plan, which is one reason the economics of an Aegon SIPP transfer are often favourable.
What is the Overseas Transfer Charge, and does it apply to my Aegon transfer?
The Overseas Transfer Charge (OTC) is a 25 percent tax charge that applies to transfers from UK-registered pension schemes into a QROPS, unless a specific exemption applies. It does not apply to transfers into an International SIPP, because an International SIPP is itself a UK-registered pension scheme. This is why the vast majority of non-UK residents transferring away from Aegon go into an International SIPP rather than a QROPS.
Will I trigger a tax charge by transferring from Aegon to an International SIPP?
A transfer from an Aegon SIPP or GPP into an International SIPP is a recognised transfer between two UK-registered pension schemes and does not trigger any tax charge in itself. The pot moves across on a like-for-like basis. What drives your tax position is the timing and structure of any subsequent income drawdown, which should be planned carefully against your country of residence and any applicable double taxation agreement.
I am a US resident. Are there specific issues with my Aegon SIPP?
Yes, several. While SIPP holdings are exempt from PFIC reporting during accumulation under the US-UK DTA, the Aegon platform itself was not designed to serve US persons on an ongoing basis, and some of the fund products on the platform can create compliance complications. Aegon also does not provide the US-specific tax reporting documentation that US persons often need. The International SIPP route we use for US clients is specifically structured to avoid these issues and sits within a compliant US-UK cross-border framework.
How long does an Aegon SIPP transfer usually take?
In our experience, an Aegon SIPP transfer to an International SIPP typically completes within six to twelve weeks, depending on how quickly the MoneyHelper safeguarding appointment (where required) is completed and on the responsiveness of the receiving provider. We manage the process end to end, so the member is not the one chasing either side.
Do I need to liquidate my investments before transferring from Aegon?
In most cases, yes. Transfers between UK SIPP platforms are generally carried out as cash transfers, which means the existing investments are sold, the cash moves across to the new provider, and the new portfolio is constructed at the receiving end. In-specie transfers are possible in limited circumstances but are rarely the most efficient path. The timing of the liquidation and reinvestment is part of the advice process.