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Retirement Planner · Track 2
G2 of 9 — Input guides

Portfolio: vehicles and opening balances

Your portfolio is split across up to five vehicles — Pension, Cash ISA, Stocks & Shares ISA, Lifetime ISA, and General Investment Account. Each has different tax treatment, and one (LISA) is age-locked. The split matters as much as the total.

PENSION £380k Tax-free growth Income tax on withdrawal PCLS 25% tax-free ISA £120k Tax-free growth Tax-free withdrawal No CGT, no income tax GIA £100k Taxable growth CGT on gains Annual exemption £3k TOTAL £600k Drawdown sequence ISA → GIA → Pension (tax-optimised default)
How to configure it
1
Enable your vehicles on Header setup

On the Header setup tab scroll down to Investment accounts. Click each wrapper card to toggle it on or off. Only enabled vehicles (orange border and tick) are included in the simulation. Disable any you don’t hold.

Investment accounts showing Pension/SIPP, Cash ISA, Stocks and Shares ISA and GIA wrapper cards
2
Enter balances per vehicle on the Investments tab

Go to the Investments tab. Under each vehicle, pick an asset class from the dropdown and enter the current value in pounds. The % Now column calculates automatically. Add a row for each asset class you hold within that vehicle.

Investments tab showing Pension vehicle with Global Developed-Market Equities at £420,000 (70%) and Global Aggregate Bonds at £180,000 (30%)
If your pension has multiple pots, enter the combined total. The engine treats each vehicle as one pool.
3
Set the withdrawal strategy

Go to the Withdrawal strategy tab. Choose Single strategy for a consistent approach across retirement, or Phased schedule to chain up to five different strategies across different phases. Seven strategy types are available — from a simple fixed withdrawal (S1–S3) to dynamic approaches that respond to portfolio performance (S4, S5) or maintain a cash buffer (S6), or match your planned expenses exactly (S7). For each phase, set the strategy, start year, amount or rate, and frequency.

Withdrawal strategy tab showing phased schedule with 7 strategy cards and a 3-phase matrix configured with S3, S4 and S2
The engine applies the active strategy month by month. In a phased schedule, it switches strategy automatically at each phase’s start year. The phase timeline bar shows the window for each phase at a glance.
How the engine treats each vehicle
4
Pension

Withdrawals are subject to income tax above the personal allowance. The first 25% of the pension can be taken as a pension commencement lump sum (PCLS) tax-free. The engine models PCLS events if configured.

The engine tracks the personal allowance across income sources. If guaranteed income (e.g. State Pension) already uses the allowance, pension withdrawals are taxed from the first pound.
5
ISA (Cash and Stocks & Shares)

All withdrawals are tax-free. No income tax, no CGT. The engine draws ISA before other vehicles in ISA-first sequence, maximising tax-free income early in retirement.

6
Lifetime ISA (LISA)

Tax-treated like a regular ISA — tax-free growth, tax-free withdrawal — but with two HMRC constraints the engine enforces literally:

• Locked until age 60. The engine treats the LISA balance as zero for withdrawal purposes until the user’s age reaches 60. Pre-60 the LISA simply doesn’t participate in the draw order — the engine pulls from Cash ISA, S&S ISA, GIA, or Pension first. From age 60 onwards LISA joins the ISA group normally.

• £4,000/year contribution cap. If you set a LISA contribution above this on an annualised basis the row shows a soft warning. The engine still runs — the warning flags the HMRC rule, it doesn’t block the simulation.

No penalty modelling. The 25% early-withdrawal penalty real-life LISA holders face is not simulated — the engine just refuses to draw pre-60. If you retire at 55 with a LISA balance, expect to see it grow untouched in the fan chart until month 60 of the simulation, then start participating in withdrawals.
LISA balances are also excluded as a destination for Bed & ISA transfers (Guide G8). The engine routes Bed & ISA proceeds into Cash ISA or S&S ISA only.
7
GIA (General Investment Account)

The engine tracks a cost basis for the GIA. Withdrawals trigger a CGT calculation on the gain portion, subject to the annual CGT exemption (£3,000 in 2025/26). After-tax proceeds flow to the cash buffer.

The engine uses a conservative cost basis approach — it does not track individual lots. For most users this produces a slight overestimate of CGT, which is the direction of safety.
What the vehicle split does to outcomes
8
A larger ISA reduces lifetime tax

The more of your portfolio that sits in ISA, the less income tax and CGT the engine deducts over time. This directly increases the cash available for spending.

9
A large GIA late in retirement can hurt

If the GIA is drawn last (pension-first sequence), accumulated gains may trigger significant CGT late in retirement when the portfolio is already under pressure.

Use the Bed & ISA feature (Guide G8) to migrate GIA assets into ISA before retirement — sheltering future growth and reducing the late-retirement CGT burden.
10
Opening cash balance — what you carry into retirement

Below the five investment vehicles, you can enter an Opening Cash Balance — non-invested cash you carry into retirement from savings accounts, current accounts, or other liquid holdings.

This is separate from your investment vehicles. It works as your day-to-day spending account in the simulation: expenses are paid from cash first, and withdrawals from ISA/GIA/Pension replenish it. The balance earns interest at the cash rate.

If you have £20,000–£50,000 in savings at retirement, entering this here means the simulation won’t need to sell investments in the first few months — your cash covers expenses while your portfolio settles. This is especially valuable if markets dip early in retirement.
Track 2 · G2 of 9