Former employee Jacqueline Alders
25-02-2023
When I started up my Teams connection, Jacqueline was already waiting in the lobby. Her face smiling, a full bookcase behind her. “All of these books are about The Hague,” she told me later. She needed to learn everything there is to know about the city when she left NN to become a city tour guide. “I started working at NN back in 1985 and kept going until 2014.” “That sounds like it was a burden,” I remarked. “Well, at the end it did feel that way to me. That's why I left the company voluntarily, at a time when there were many redundancies. I saw opportunities elsewhere, and I'm very glad I left the company in good harmony.”
“I enjoyed working at NN. I was able to do lots of different things there. I started out as a software trainer and switched to different positions after that, always in teams where we were helping to improve the administrative processes. In The Hague, in Amsterdam for a while, in Rotterdam and towards the end I was even working in the eastern town of Ede one day a week.”
Self-employed professional
“I am now working as a self-employed city tour guide in The Hague. First as a freelancer, but it turned out I was a little too headstrong for that. So I decided to start my own business. And as you know, when your work is your hobby, it’s simply a lot of fun. You tend to forget that it takes more than that to run your own business. The administrative matters, the website, attracting customers... Those things took me a lot of time in the first two years. And during the lull of the two Covid years, I spent time improving my German language skills. But last year, I had an absolutely excellent year. It was super. And I'm often hired by former colleagues who follow me on LinkedIn. They combine a city tour with a nice dinner and a visit to the beach.”
What if...?
“When I left NN, I made a fact sheet. I was 57 at the time, so my retirement and my AOW state pension were still far away. I made some calculations and checked my buffers. My husband is a bit older than I am and is already getting his AOW. I made a list of all these things, including details from my pension funds, which I found on my UPO and the government's website mijnpensioenoverzicht.nl. I worked out several ‘what if’ situations. I would advise everyone to do this. It gave me the confidence to take this step. The nice thing is that my little business has become such a success that I haven't needed to use my pension yet. It's wonderful to be able to decide on a year-to-year basis whether or not you want your pension to start paying out.”
Not my main concern
“Pension was not my main concern. That's the luxury of working at NN. You simply know your pension is being taken care of. I was already consulting my UPO every year to find the factor A for my annual tax return, so I was familiar with the UPO and how it's set up. Working at Life, I was already well informed on pensions. And if I had any questions, I could always ask one of the smart tax lawyers in our department.”
Confidence in yourself
“When I approached a financial planner with a software programme many years ago, I thought, ‘I can do that myself!’ Using common sense, searching things on the internet and posing questions, you can get organised. It was a good thing I did that, because at first I didn't know anything about it. It’s like solving a problem with an electronic device. Sometimes you need someone's assistance and sometimes you can solve it yourself by using ‘Google’. You need to have the confidence that you can solve things by yourself.”
Join us
“As well as being a self-employed professional, I also have time for volunteers work, so I started taking an active part in NN's Association of former employees (VO-NN). The association represents its members’ interests in various fields, including pension, but it also offers a lot of social interaction through excursions and meetings. For example, some of the members are taking time to study the new Pension Act and explain it to us in plain language. You can always approach them if you have questions. It's wonderful that they’re doing that, because they're simply volunteers too. That's why my best tip is to join the association when you leave NN. Regardless of whether you leave the company before or after your retirement. And I think it's good to realise that I can do the things I enjoy doing, because I know my pension is well sorted.