Planning for retirement

Everyone’s journey to retirement and experience of retiring will be different. Planning ahead will make this process easier and provide an opportunity to consider what works best for you. It's possible that health, caring obligations or other unforeseen circumstances might force retirement to happen earlier than expected. 

As part of planning for retirement, we recommend you: 

• talk with colleagues and seek advice 
• discuss plans with family and friends 
• visit your GP to discuss health care needs 
• assess your financial circumstances
• seek professional financial advice 
• explore interests and hobbies. 

If you plan to retire soon, make sure you understand the steps involved in retiring from practice and continue to meet all your CPD requirements whilst you are a registered practitioner. You might want to speak to your regulatory body, employer, insurer and the College for further support.

Winding down or reducing hours 

Rather than immediately ceasing full-time practice, some psychiatrists find it helpful to ‘wind down’ in the years leading up to their retirement. This might look like: 

• reducing hours or days of work
• accepting fewer or no new patients
• moving to locum work
• changing roles such as undertaking non-clinical work.

Working reduced hours or part-time does not qualify you for a deferral or exemption from annual CPD requirements. Contact cpdhelp@ranzcp.org for advice on your individual situation.

Closing a psychiatry practice

Closing a private practice can be challenging. Explore our closing a practice resources for information and advice to support you in this process.

Your wellbeing and support needs

You may feel pressure to continue working even though are ready to retire. Burnout is common in caring professions, leading to doctors retiring earlier than planned.

You might want to:

• speak with and seek support from your GP, family, friends or colleagues.
• connect with a retired member for advice and support through the Retirement Conversations mentoring stream.
• explore the College’s retiring well content. 

Some members take a break from practice before fully retiring. 

Ready to retire?

Go to retiring from practice for information on ceasing your practising registration with the medical regulator and how to notify the College of your retirement.

Resources

The Transition to Retirement Working Group has drawn together some resources to assist you with planning and moving into retirement:

• Planning for a successful transition to retirement (Avant)
• Transition to retirement modules (Avant)
• A guide for medical practitioners transitioning to an encore career or retirement (Wijeratne & Earl, MJA 2020) [Journal access required]
• Closing up and moving on: a personal perspective of psychiatric practice closure (Neill D, 2016)

Contact 

RANZCP Member Services 
memberhelp@ranzcp.org
1800 337 448 (from Australia)
0800 443 827 (from New Zealand)
+61 3 9640 0646 (from overseas)