Thank you captainendeavour - oh dear didnt the SS Endeavour sink - that is v. useful. Looks like one has to be persistent.
OMG quel cauchemar
getting what belongs to one is a battle of attrition survival of the fittest and stuff - reminds me of banks selling ptrotection to people on guaranteed incomes - these bods are under orders - did you see TV series Industry?
have handed this over to OH - will answer when hew answers me -
I have drawn 75K, in several tranches, from my UNI pension and as JaneJones states you will be whacked for tax under the French regime.
Including the Prudential, I transferred six/seven pensions (canât remember) into the QROP - itâs a Malta based scheme /admin as you rightly said there are no French schemes approved by the UK regulator. I use Blevins Franks (other advisors exist). It was relatively easy once i had completed all the forms for the different pension companies and Blevins team did the rest to then actually get the pension pots transferred into the QROP.
The Royal navy has had many ships named âEndeavourâ. One served Capt Cook on one of his epics in the South Seas.
Did you know that Cook never lost a man to scurvy, at a time when ships were regularly over-crewed x3 because so many died of it? He did not know of the connection between citrus fruit and Vit C - the discovery of vitamins came later but he realised that fresh produce, esp fruit and veg, seemed to protect against scrurvy and regularly airing out the ships by lighting braziers in the bilges.
No. My âEndeavourâ is a much more recent ship, a ship my uncle sailed in. He escaped the sinking of his ship, HMS Prince of Wales, off Singapore [serving as a C.P.O.] and equally miraculously, avoided capture.
The band of men in this position managed to make it to an island where they found on old tramp steamer which had served the Dutch trading posts around Indonesia. They commandeered this ship, which they named âEndeavourâ â'Cosâ, as my uncle would say in his Somerset accent, âwe wuz endeavourinâ to escape, see?â
Without charts, they sailed at night to avoid detection by the Jap airforce, moored up at dawn, covering the ship with foliage and, whenever possible, trekking inland to the now deserted Dutch trading posts, each man returning carrying a sack of coal.
Eventually they reached British held territory and the adventure on âEndeavourâ was over.
He named his cottage in the family village of West Monkton, near Taunton, âEndeavour Cottageâ.
His brother, youngest of my grandfatherâs three sons, was not so fortunate. He was lost in the dreadful debacle that was the sinking of HMSs Glorious, Ancaster and Ardent.
2 Likes
@captainendeavour as always - a mine of information 
Thanks @PeterJ . I consolidated all my various pensions just before moving to France into a Prudential SIPP, which has actually done OK so far, even with the ups and downs during Covid. So, for me it may end up being simpler still. After having researched this, Malta did seem to be the best bet.
This is not my area for a while yet but seems to me it may be wiser to go for the bird in the hand now, rather than wait for the two in the bush later.
Bank confirms pension funds almost collapsed amid market meltdown | Pensions industry | The Guardian
Later, the cupboard may be bare
On retirement from The Royal Corps of Signals my dear old dad, whose nickname round the office* was âMastermindâ, was presented with an exact replica of the one they dish out on the telly prog of that name, made by the same glassworks.
Reason was, if anyone needed to know something or find something out, ask Gordon Nation [Maj. R.Sigs. Ret]
How he would have loved GoogleâŚ
- Nickname of one of his C.Oâs was âChairman Maoâ because he was alway âhaving thoughtsâ.
One was to find out if the soldiery were dutifully saluting his car as it passed, so he sent it on tour for days around Catterick Garrison, flying his ensign but not on board.
Any squaddie who failed to salute this car was hauled into it and taken to the Guardhouse, up on a charge.
Then there was the Sgt Maj who had the coal dump whitewashed every time a load was taken from it, exposing unsightly black stuff.
How he would have loved GoogleâŚ
1 Like