Vital advice on your pension

Today, at enormous expense, I have hired a pensions expert to answer all your worried letters about your pension arrangements.

After taking advice from my financial adviser, I have taken out a personal pension scheme linked to life insurance and mortgage repayments, which involves me paying £340 a month. This wouldn't worry me so much, except that he insists that I pay the £340 to him in person every month, in used £10 notes, in a brown manilla envelope, which I am to hand over in a pub on the outskirts of town. Is this normal?

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact an expert at once.

After taking advice from my financial adviser, I have decided to take out a personal pension policy involving premiums of about £500 a month. The only thing that worries me, apart from the size of the monthly payment, is the fact that I have never heard of the pension company involved (My Personal Pension Scheme). Of course, it may well be that when my financial adviser says: "You should put all your money in my personal pension scheme," he is not referring to the pension scheme by name at all, but simply as his own personal, as it were, pension scheme. Somehow, though, I find it hard to say to him: "Excuse me, but when you say `my personal pension scheme', are you using capital letters or not?" How should I get the truth out of him?

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact contact an expert at once.

I have been trying for many years now to get to see the opera singer Luciano Pavarotti in person, but on the few occasions when I have actually secured a ticket for a Pavarotti concert or opera, he has not actually turned up to sing. Is there any pension scheme you could recommend which could offer insurance against future disappointments along these lines? What I am really looking for is a policy which will (a) recompense me for missing more Pavarotti shows; (b) insure me against the constant stress and strain involved, which is having an adverse health effect on me; (c) insure Mr Pavarotti himself against indisposition due to unhealthy lifestyle and overweight.

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact an expert at once.

Are their any pension schemes for household pets? I am looking particularly for a policy which, after my death, would give my cats two hearty meals a day, a regular look at any programme involving Bruce Forsyth (still their favourite comedian!) and some insurance against a Labour government, under which none of them has ever lived.

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact an expert at once.

I am the prime minister of a small island kingdom just off the coast of France, and I had been hoping to stay in the post for many years to come. However, the recent success of the left-wing candidate in France does worry me, as if a similar leftward swing were to take place in this country I would be out on my ear. Is there any scheme which would give me lots of money if I were to be turfed out of Downing Street?

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact an expert at once.

I don't believe you've hired an expert at all for this pension advice column. I think you're just conning us. I wouldn't be surprised at all if you hadn't hired your wife or secretary to churn out this rubbish, having registered her under a false name for the purpose. Or maybe you've just employed a photocopier for the purpose. I bet at the end you say that cannot enter into any correspondence, which is always the sure sign of a dud advice column.

Our expert writes: There are many different pension schemes on the market these days, one of which is bound to be tailor-made for you. If in any doubt at all, you should contact an expert at once.

Please note that I cannot enter into any correspondence about the advice given.