Tracking down a workplace pension

[MickiQ]

so is 9 years worth of a final salary pension worth chasing up then?

Yes it would be about 15% of the salary he was on when he left, so if he was being paid £10K a year it would buy him £1500 a year extra pension if he left it till 65, if he took it at 55 he'd lose 30-40% of it depending on scheme rules but still around £900-£1000 plus a year

 

[Orang Utan]

9 years is roughly about a quarter of a career in the public sector - so it'll be worth getting.

It helps to have worked the right 9 years. I was just looking through a history of public sector pay restraint:

2010 - 2012 - 2 year pay freeze except workers earning below £21k
2013- 2015 - limited to an average of 1% a year
2015-2017 - limited to an average of 1% a year
2018-2020 - no explicit pay policy
2021 - pay freeze, excluding NHS workers and those earning below £24,000

As a public sector worker myself, this years does feel like continuation of a "lost decade".

that 9 years was in the private sector, sort of, but it was between the years of 2001 and 2010

 

[AnnaKarpik]

Hi, an ex-colleague reminded me that the company we used to work for had a final salary pension scheme. i probably didn’t know what that meant at the time, so will have 9 years worth of pension to track down. It should be easy to do so, despite the fact that the government pension finder website gave the details of the wrong company. i have never thought about pensions much and have never saved, so would be interested to see if i will have a less poverty stricken retirement than i imagined.
how do people keep on top of their workplace pensions and can you consolidate them to make them easier to track?

Pension providers who have out of date contact details get in touch with the NI people who then contact you when you hit 60 something so you can find your old bits of pension.

 

[Orang Utan]

I think the problem with the govt pension tracker is that it generally only tells you the pension provider for the company now, but very good at telling you the ones they might have used in the past (not used it myself however).

aye, it gave me the details of a pension tracking company not the actual pension fund managers, but they were able to get the current manager’s details for me

 

[weltweit]

(I speak, however, as someone without adequate pension provision).

Me too, am busily saving as fast as I can atm to try to offset penury..

 

[StoneRoad]

That's assuming the State Pension is actually worth anything when you (finally) get it --- given that they've moved the age at which you can get your pension several times already and changed the qualifying / contribution rules as well.

My original plans were based on retiring somewhere between 55 and 60 - depending on how much I was enjoying work at the time, with the prospect of a decent state pension ...
Now, I will have to work until I'm at least 66.
They changed the rules far too late for me to be able to build up anything in a private pension and still have enough money to live on ... especially as I've had a somewhat chequered time, in and out of employment a fair number of times. Several times I spent over a year claiming benefits before getting another decent post ...
Finally, I have accrued enough contributions for a full state pension (unless the rules change again) but only because as I got credited with them as part of my carer's allowance for my elderly father in the last few years.
Luckily, my OH's a teacher and their pension scheme is a good, final salary one. Funnily enough, whenever I got accosted by the private pension promotors / scammers and I told 'em what my OH did for a living they very soon fuked off, as they couldn't improve on the provisions of the teaching scheme.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

aye, it gave me the details of a pension tracking company not the actual pension fund managers, but they were able to get the current manager’s details for me

there is a government service to do this. hope you didn't pay them anything to do this...

 

[Supine]

so is 9 years worth of a final salary pension worth chasing up then?

definitely. Absolutely!!!

 

[Supine]

so is 9 years worth of a final salary pension worth chasing up then?

definitely. Absolutely!!!

 

[Orang Utan]

there is a government service to do this. hope you didn't pay them anything to do this...

you are referring to the service i mention in both the post you quote, the post I am quoting in that post AND the OP

 

[Puddy_Tat]

you are referring to the service i mention in both the post you quote, the post I am quoting in that post AND the OP

that's all right then

 

[MrSki]

I have an old pension that was a 11% non-con from an old employer. Lost all the the paperwork relating to it but if my memory serves me it was about 25K I can remember one day under the influence not long after the crash shifting it all to the pacific basin fund. Not sure if this was wise or not & can't remember who it was with but I hope the pacific basin has done well in the last decade.