At the Retirement Planning Council of Ireland, Mr Eamon Donnelly helps advise older people on how to adjust during the transition from full to part-time work. It is a process he has gone through himself.

Three-and-a-half years ago, at the age of 59, Mr Donnelly sold shares he held in the company for which he worked, and stopped working as a full-time pensions consultant for the company.

"I realised at that age that I wanted to work and I needed to work," says Mr Donnelly. He now does "a whole lot of little bits and pieces" of work, including his training work at the Retirement Planning Council and some consultancy for the Irish Association of Pension Funds. A father of four and a grandfather of four, he also plays golf and tries to take holidays every year. His wife has been working part-time for five years now, having returned to work after raising their children.

He would like to continue working in some capacity until the age of 70, provided he is healthy enough. "What exactly that work will be, I don't know," he says.

Adjusting to retirement is a challenge, he adds. "Your lifestyle changes and the lifestyle of your partner changes as well. I work from home sometimes now and that leads to a degree of adjustment in my wife's life too.

"Men in the traditional model will start to apply business principles to the home that has been working perfectly well without them for 30 or 40 years," according to Mr Donnelly.

He paid into a personal pension as he moved between jobs over the course of his working life and is now drawing on that pension. He bought an annuity three years ago - before managed pension funds started to lose money.

"Annuity rates were low, but I knew that I would never get the same capital appreciation. I bought an annuity so I could have a guaranteed return based on those lump sums," says Mr Donnelly. "I'm glad I did it now."