Non-motoring > 100% Retired Miscellaneous
Thread Author: Bromptonaut Replies: 18
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 15:30 
 100% Retired - Bromptonaut
I was 66 yesterday so can collect the State Pension.

The project I was working on at CAB had its funding reduced effective 31-12 due to falling workload. We were boosted numerically form early 2024 while people were migrated to Universal Credit but that's now done. Avoiding putting others on a redundancy was another tick in the go now box and I've done my last shift today.

Looking forward to spending a lot more time with Mrs B and in our caravan starting with Christmas at Southport CAMC site. Hopefully we'll actually get on site this time after cancelling in 22 and 23 due to (a) Mrs B being hospitalised with pneumonia and (b) car's No. 1 injector throwing a wobbly on the M1.

Need to book a couple of holidays too. Tenerife in March and Madeira in June. Week on Harris with daughter and her hubby plus grandson G already booked for late May.

Tour de France 2026 is doing Alpe D'huez which also needs sorting.
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 15:40 
 100% Retired - Fullchat
You are but a boy. Looks like you've filled some time ahead. Enjoy retirement Bromp.
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 22:02 
 100% Retired - Duncan
>> You are but a boy. Looks like you've filled some time ahead. Enjoy retirement Bromp.
>>

As are you. Multiple successive retirements is the thing to go for now.

I think I retired three times. The last time in December 2019.
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 03:01 
 100% Retired - Bromptonaut
>> I think I retired three times. The last time in December 2019.

Back in the eighties Civil Servants past retirement age, notionally 60 I think, could remain 'in harness' but had to, successively, drop grades as they got older.

One of my colleagues dropped from SEO grade - like head of a reasonable sized unit - to being a pretty junior clerk.

He hailed from Donegal or thereabouts with a near incomprehensible accent.

His last leaving card included the line 'Did You Hear About the Irishman Who Retired Three Times'

I left the CS in 2013 a few days short of 54 on pension in lieu of redundancy. Short break then did ten more years from 55 doing (mostly) welfare rights stuff so guess I went twice.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Fri 19 Dec 25 at 03:06
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 15:53 
 100% Retired - Kevin
Happy birthday Bromp. Slap-up meal and a pint tonight?

>Tour de France 2026 is doing Alpe D'huez which also needs sorting.

Respect. TdF on a Brompton takes some doing.
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 16:02 
 100% Retired - Bromptonaut
>> Happy birthday Bromp. Slap-up meal and a pint tonight?

That was last night. Village has gone from one 'boozer' type pub to that plus two restaurant/pub places in last ten days - two reopenings. We tried the nearer one.

Excellent food and good drink though at £100 for starters, mains, pre meal G&t *2 and four glasses of wine it'll not be a weekly event.

That said the place was a pub that does food when we moved here in 1990. I'm not sure that what we paid then for 2 steak and chips and four pints, linked to CPI, would be massively less.

>> Respect. TdF on a Brompton takes some doing.

Indeedy.

Some blokes hired what was then a Boris Bike in London, drove it to Mont Ventoux and rode it up there.

Chapeau.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Thu 18 Dec 25 at 16:03
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 16:44 
 100% Retired - Terry
Retirement is great. Enjoy it, you have earned it.
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 16:54 
 100% Retired - Ted

Hope it's a long one Bromps. I retired first time at 49 then started again with a Civil Service job. 80 at New Year, seem to have far too much to do on my plate now !

Ted
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 19:44 
 100% Retired - legacylad
Enjoy your retirement. All the best for 2026 & beyond.
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 23:31 
 100% Retired - Andrew-T
>> Retirement is great. Enjoy it, you have earned it. >>

Several years ago I realised that I had been a pensioner longer than I had been employed by the company that still pays the pension. Lucky I chose a good one ....
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New Thu 18 Dec 25 20:17 
 100% Retired - tyrednemotional
I'm a week off 17 years of retirement Bromp. It's a tough job, but someone's got to do it.

If you're anything like me, you'll wonder where all your time has gone (and where all that money is coming from ;-) )
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 05:58 
 100% Retired - ORB>>
Happy retirement Mr B...
One of my happy retirement bits is the partial state pension I get paid from Switzerland.

The total paid to me since I started claiming at 65 is more than my actual contributions.
Happy days
..
Last edited by: ORB>> on Fri 19 Dec 25 at 06:01
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 06:45 
 100% Retired - Falkirk Bairn
A person I knew took early retirement as Head of English in a local secondary. He was 55 ish & took early retirement with pension made up to as if he were aged 60 - it was to clear out older staff and promote younger ones.

40 years later, he coming up for 95, still has almost all of his marbles and lives on his own.
Retired 6 years longer than his whole working life.

It's 19 years since I retired - I missed going to work for a good few years.

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New Fri 19 Dec 25 08:12 
 100% Retired - De Sisti
I retired early four and a half years ago (even though I could have continued way past 60) and my final salary pension is about the same as my net-pay minus the mortgage payment I was making.
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 09:14 
 100% Retired - Zero
Right ( cue monty p 4 yorkshire men sketch)

Born 1954, started work 1970, retired 2010

retirement is the best job I ever had. (if you exclude volunteering at the 2012 olympics)
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 11:33 
 100% Retired - Duncan
Sold my business in 1992 and retired, aged 57. Very quickly got bored and set up another business.

Got rid of that at the end of 2010 and retired aged 76.

Gave up my last paid employment - match steward at Harlequins - at the end of 2019 - I found that I was getting grumpy - now there's a surprise!
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 09:18 
 100% Retired - John F
I was 76 a few days ago - have had the good fortune of nearly ten years of full retirement, obscurity, good health and an inflation linked pension. Probably the best years of my life. The trouble is, they seem to have slipped past very quickly! I hope you will enjoy similar - make the most of them.
I hope you enjoy Alpe d'Huez better than we did 30yrs ago - the ugliest, most barren and user-unfriendly ski resort we have ever been to - and I severely sprained my shoulder making steering our heavily loaded Passat GL5 estate back down the hairpins an exceedingly unpleasant task.
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 10:28 
 100% Retired - Kevin
Another Trivia Alert:

Somewhere in the BBC archives there will be film of me skiing at Alpe d'Huez. It was a company jolly team building exercise and the BBC had been contracted to produce a video of the event.

To get shots of us from the front the cameraman was skiing backwards down the slopes operating a huge camera on a spring loaded stabiliser contraption. Showoff.
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New Fri 19 Dec 25 12:11 
 100% Retired - Bromptonaut
HMRC are up to date already.

P45 was in my inbox this morning and I've had an email from HMRC with a revised tax code reflecting state pension and fact I'm no longer employed.

I know from working on Universal Credit claims how 'Real Time Information' works but not up close and personal like that.
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