Find Lost Pension
Published / Last Updated on 10/02/2015
Video looks at older pensions that you have lost touch with if you have moved, changed name or the pension has moved, changed its name etc. and how to find a lost pension using the Pension Tracing Service.
Transcript:
“Hello there. This is a very quick video to do with lost pensions. Find your lost pension.
On average people move jobs every 5 to 7 years and you may or may not been a member of a pension scheme and what’s triggered this recently: I have been dealing with a case where her quite literally a retired gentleman had moved around a few times and all of that and had totally forgotten about a pension scheme. Now, as a result, that's presented some difficulty in terms of how this client will be able to take their pension benefits.
But I am sure that there are many people out there where they lose track of their pensions. Not just because you've moved: so you may have moved address 2,3,4,5 times since you last worked for XYZ company and was a member of a pension scheme 20 or 30 years ago but likewise pensions change, pensions get wound up, pension companies get taken over. We only have to look at well if you remember companies like GRE the Guardian Royal Exchange, Scottish Equitable, General Accident, Equity and Law: where have all those companies gone? If you took out a pension with General Accident where is it now? Commercial Union there is another one. ‘Blasts from the past’ all these names are but you may have taken out a pension with General Accident, Commercial Union (commercial onion) as I sometimes used to say and companies that the names have disappeared and you don’t know where they are.
It may be that you had an employers, a company pension scheme and that company closed 10,20,30 years ago. Where’s that pension gone? So, its becoming ‘flavour of the month’ because I'm shooting this video in February at 2015, the new pensions flexibility laws start in April and pensions are definitely on the agenda not just for government but for people themselves and all of a sudden it's like: “where are my pensions? Can I find my pensions?
Have you lost track of the pension? So finding a lost pension: the Department for Work and Pensions, the old DSS, the DWP as they are known now, they offer a pension tracing service and it's free. So all you need to do is go to the DWP website, the Department for Work Pensions website and there is a simple online for that you can complete and they will trace your pension for free because they have records via the DWP and via HMRC. A pension fund was technically a tax privileged savings plan so it had to be registered with HMRC, so they can trace them, they will trace them and it's free.
[And] they are expecting increased demand where the DWP has the pension tracing team of actually increased their staff by a third just to allow for more and more people thinking about pensions and trying to trace their old pensions. So if you're stuck then search online for ‘pension tracing service’ or go to the Department for Work Pensions, the DWP's website and search for it or alternatively what I have done is at the end of this video I given the website link as well just that you can use that.
So lost pension, forgotten pension, you've moved, you've changed names, they've moved, they've changed names, employers gone under, whatever it might be, you can still trace your pension. Thanks very much for watching.”
