I understand I can buy an annuity from Equitable or another company but I need something which can be activated within, say, a month and I have been told that a stakeholder pension offers this facility. VG, Diss.Peter Miller, pensions specialist at advisers Hacker Young, says: “You appear to have a retirement annuity plan with Equitable Life that will have a value at maturity of £26,500 “if guaranteed terms apply”. This means £26,500 would be available if pension benefits were being secured. Pension benefits can be secured by either the purchase of an annuity or by the establishment of a personal pension withdrawal plan (drawdown) with either Equitable Life or an alternative pension provider.”Guaranteed terms do not apply if the pension fund is simply transferred out of the with-profits fund to an Equitable Life unit-linked fund or to another pension provider. If guaranteed terms were not applicable, an 11.1 per cent penalty would be applied to the fund value on transfer. This penalty would be applied even if the stated retirement age on the contract had passed.”The earliest a policyholder can draw the benefits from a retirement annuity plan is their 60th birthday. After that, a policy holder is free to buy an annuity at any time.

There should be no undue delay in establishing an annuity with either Equitable Life or an alternative annuity provider.”A personal pension withdrawal plan would not be a viable alternative in this case because it has relatively high fixed costs. Your pension fund can be used to purchase an annuity at any time after the age of 60 without penalty, which appears to provide the flexibility you are seeking.”Transferring to a stakeholder pension would not provide additional flexibility as far as annuity purchase is concerned and transferring from Equitable Life without securing pension benefits immediately would result in an 11.1 per cent penalty being incurred.”If you have questions about personal finance, write to Questions of Cash, ‘The Independent’, 191 Marsh Wall, London E14 9RS, or e-mail cash independent.co.uk We regret that we can reply only to letters published here. The stock market is an unforgiving place. When a successful company suddenly blots its copybook it can take many years before its misdemeanour is pardoned and investor confidence returns. But Landround, a little AIM-traded business that has carved out a niche providing travel-based promotions, appears to have reestablished its old relationship with investors in double-quick time

The stock market is an unforgiving place.

Profits crashed from £1.5m to £159,000 and the dividend was slashed. Last week, it demonstrated it was again among the more exciting companies on the junior Alternative Investment Market.Interim profits emerged at £896,000 and it looks as though the year’s results will be a record £1.7m. Next year’s figure could be £2.25m.The shares, at 250p, are still a long way below their 400p peak but that is more a reflection of the more subdued stock market atmosphere than any lingering despair over the profits slump.Landround was laid low by the successful launch of what is known as a “buy and fly” scheme, a rival to Air Miles. The launch cost was more than envisaged and it probably devoted too much attention to the new exercise at the expense of other operations. The foot-and-mouth epidemic also took its toll.Still, its recovery has been remarkable.

Many parts of the travel industry are still reeling from the devastation caused by the terror attacks on the US. The group has also had to shrug off the international tension as well as the economic slowdown. The founding chairman, Michael Crompton, says the company’s performance this year underlines the defensive merits of sales promotion, an activity I would have regarded as an early casualty of the present environment.Mr Crompton, with his wife Jan as bookkeeper, started the Chester-based company in 1992 It was their fourth time around. Their first venture was a frozen food operation; then came a couple of promotion companies specialising in hotel stays. The two promotion businesses merged with other operations with Mr Crompton sacrificing control. He was, therefore, unable to prevent them running into trouble.So when Landround was floated on AIM in the summer of 1997 he was determined to keep a firm grip on the company It is a team operation. Besides Mr and Mrs Crompton, two Landround operation directors, Janet Wilcock and Tina Mills, were involved in the earlier promotional businesses The company’s business model is simple.