Hi linday,
Well i have done all that you are about to do so if you want to PM me about anything in particular then fee free to do so.
In a nutshell though,and regards pensions, I did the following;
I opened a new "Cash only" pension fund in the UK pror to leaving, into this I transfered all of my various bits of pensions ( from different company's over the years). This makes it a lot easier to transfer once you have made the move. It's important to know that once you commit to a transfer into a suitable Superannuation fund then you are basically stuck with it and if you returned to the UK at a future date then you would be drawing your pension through your Oz pension and transfering that back through the exchange system ( Not good).
The downside that I experienced was that while the pension money sat in the new pension fund it made zilch in interest but amazingly I paid all sorts of transfer charges and also charges for " Managing" the account! these companies should all wear masks as it's robbery on a grand scale. I know that all companies which are holding your hard earned pension money are allowed to make a profit but when you consider what work is actually carried out then they must be charging a million an hour!!
Well turned into a bit of a rant i'm afraid.
Enough to say that you have to look carefully at ALL the hidden charges as it's not what they tell you they will charge it's what they don't tell you, using weasel wording and the knowledge that you the client is already on high dough with the stress of moving etc.
