In the latest instalment of Money Talk, Jan, aged 60 from Cambridge, wrote to Express Money regarding her search to find old pension arrangements. Having reached an important age milestone, Jan realised some of her pensions would be maturing this year and wanted to find her lost funds. Express.co.uk spoke to Christine Ross, Head of Private Office, North at Handlesbanken Wealth Management, and gained other further insight to help Jan best answer her query.
“For the last year, I have been trying to trace pensions from when I started work.
“Over the years, some of my paperwork has been misplaced, so for the early part of my career I have little or no information.
“While the Government website is helpful, I have found some of the information to be out of date - pensions have been moved to other providers, and in one case, although I know the name of the person is right, they won’t reply to my letters.
“What is your advice for tracing really old pensions that have been moved and moved again?
“I may have money, I may not. What might be your advice when you keep hitting brick walls?”
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Christine Ross, Head of Private Office, North at Handlesbanken Wealth Management, said: “Most pension schemes of which you have been a member must send you a statement each year. These statements include an estimate of the retirement income that the pension pot might generate when you reach retirement.
“If you are no longer receiving these statements, perhaps because of changes of address, then to track down the pension there are three bodies you can contact: the pension provider, the Pension Tracing Service, or your former employer if it was a workplace pension.
“It does appear that you may already have taken these first steps in attempting to trace your pensions, without success.
“If you cannot find the contact details of an old employer, or you do not know the provider of an old personal pension you can contact the Pension Tracing Service.
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“This is a free service which searches a database of more than 200,000 workplace and personal pension schemes to try to find the contact details you need.
“You can phone the Pension Tracing Service on 0800 731 0193 or you can complete an online request form.”
For those who are not as far in their pension search as Jan, there are other options worth exploring.
Individuals who know which pension provider their pension was with should first contact them, providing as many details as possible.
Those who do not have a plan or membership number to hand may even be able to trace their records through a date of birth and National Insurance number.
Ms Ross continued: “You should ask for details current pension fund or the guaranteed pension income due to you.
“Ask for a copy of the scheme booklet which will outline all of the benefits available to you including any death benefits that may be payable to your family after your lifetime.
“If you were a member of a scheme many years ago, and that membership lasted less than two years, it is possible that you were given a refund of your own contributions and have no further entitlement under that scheme.”
However, there is a slightly different course of action for individuals who had a pension with a provider, such as an insurance company.
Ms Ross explained: “Here, you should request full details of the plan including how this is invested and the charges for managing the plan.
“You should also ask for details of any charges associated with potentially transferring the arrangement if you ultimately decide to consolidate all your pension plans into one arrangement.”
Recent research undertaken by another organisation, Aegon, has shown 73 percent of people have multiple pension arrangements, however, within this group those who have lost track of either one or more, stands at 17 percent.
This, the organisation states, means around 6.4million people between 22 and 65 have misplaced some of their retirement savings, showing how common the issue is.
As such, Aegon has advised individuals to get pension advice if they wish to consolidate savings, in order to make sure people aren’t losing out on any valuable benefits.
However, at the same time as tracking down former personal and workplace pensions, Ms Ross concluded by advising action to be taken on the state pension.
She said: “It may also be useful to gain an estimate of the amount of State Pension you will receive based on your National Insurance contribution records to date.
“If you do not yet have sufficient National Insurance contributions to gain a full State Pension this will give you details and options regarding maximising your State Pension entitlement.”
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