Not sure what to do or where to get advice.

SSTJCKel

Pension 4 - was originally Pension 3 with Fidelity. The problem is I have no paperwork about what happened to it when I was tupee'd. I've logged into the fidelity website but I can't find out when the last employer & employee contributions were made which would tell me if the pension was continued when I was tupee'd or if I was transferred into the new employers scheme. Whatever it would only have been in place for about 6 months so only worth roughly the same as Pension 5.
Pension 6 - with my current employer i've found a contact email address within the company and i'll see what they come back with.
   My current thinking after suggestions on here is to cash in  Pension 2 and pay off my debts even though there will be tax to pay. I had never been sure if that was possible before but it seems to make sense now. Rather than paying interest on credit cards I could be ploughing the credit card payments back into a pension. I'm assuming it will be possible to make AVCs into Pension 1 or is there a better option like investing it into an ISA. Now thats a whole different path of research.
   That still leaves me unsure what to do with pensions 3 & 5.

xylophone

This pension 3/4 business is rather puzzling.

You were working for an employer who used Fidelity as a pension provider. You refer to this as Pension 3. You were TUPED into another employer who also used Fidelity but you do not know whether you or the employer contributed during this time?
The total time employed was two years?

Have you checked your state pension forecast and your NI record?

Have you checked whether your current scheme accepts transfers in?

If you access the whole of pension 2, you need to be aware that only 25% can be taken tax free and that the balance would be added to your other income for the year and taxed at whatever is the appropriate rate for your circumstances.

Be aware too that if you withdraw the whole of the pension, the initial taxation rate of the 75% is likely to be inaccurate - see https://adviser.royallondon.com/technical-central/pensions/benefit-options/emergency-tax-and-lump-sum-withdrawals/

Also be aware of the MPAA (money purchase annual allowance) which after you have flexibly accessed a DC pension  (other than under the small pots regime) restricts the amount you may  continue to contribute to any DC/Money Purchase pension to a gross £4000 per annum.

See https://www.fidelity.co.uk/retirement/money-purchase-annual-allowance/

ian16527

If you want to take the £22K, could you not open 2 more SIPPS with HL or another with Fidelity and transfer £10K into each of them. Then you could use the 3X small pot rule to take 2 X £10K and the last £2K remaining. Then this would not trigger the MPAA.
I would refinance the loan at the cheapest rate for as many years as you can live with rather than cash in the pension though, and pay the remaining balance off with some TFLS when you retire. 

SSTJCKel

ian16527 said:

If you want to take the £22K, could you not open 2 more SIPPS with HL or another with Fidelity and transfer £10K into each of them. Then you could use the 3X small pot rule to take 2 X £10K and the last £2K remaining. Then this would not trigger the MPAA.
I would refinance the loan at the cheapest rate for as many years as you can live with rather than cash in the pension though, and pay the remaining balance off with some TFLS when you retire. 

That is an interesting idea that I will investigate. Many thanks.
I've done some digging and had a stroke of luck. My current employers pension is with Scottish Widows so I rang them for a statement (because i've not received one although I've been paying into the pension for 2.5 years) They asked which policy I was talking about. Long story short my missing Pension 4 is with them as well.... So now I know that
Pension 1 - Value 100k - With Aviva
Pension 2 - Value 22k - with Fidelity
Pension 3 - Value 2k - with Fidelity
Pension 4 - Value 1.7k with Scottish Widows
Pension 5 - Value £506.73 - with Nest
Pension 6 - (current employer) Value 6k with Scottish Widows
I'm now thinking I may do as ian16527 suggests as above to transfer Pension 2 into a number of SIPPs but use these under the small pot rule to pay off the debts. Once paid off I would pay the majority of the monthly credit card payments I am currently making into the SIPPs or would these be better paid into one of the above ?
(The credit card debts are hitting my credit rating and getting a loan at a sensible interest rate has not been possible so refinancing the debts has not been possible).
I'm also thinking of combining Pensions 4 & 6 to save admin costs.
I appreciate I will be losing the lump of pension in Pension 2 but the only one to blame for my debts is me and there's a cost to everything and i'm thinking its better to pay into a SIPP than paying interest to credit card companies.
I'd be interested if anyone sees any floors in the above plan of action....

xylophone

You could open a SIPP with HL and transfer in pensions 2,3,4 and 5 which would give you a total of £26, 206.

You could ask HL to split this into three small pots,  £10,000/£10,000/6,206.

From each of the £10,000 pots you can take £2500 tax free, £7,500 taxable.

On the basis that you remain a 20% tax payer,  this would give you £17,000.

The smallest pot would yield  £1551 tax free and £4654 taxable.

On the basis you remain a 20% tax payer,  this will give you £5274.

You could take out of the third pot only as much as you need to complete paying off the debts
and then continue to contribute from the money that you had been paying monthly to the CC companies.

Once you decide to stop working, it might suit you to combine all your pensions into one scheme and draw down as best suits your needs.

And you have obtained that State Pension forecast?

LHW99

Once you are able to begin paying into a pension after paying off the debt - check whether if you put more into your current employer's pension the employer will increase their contributions - some do

SSTJCKel

xylophone said:

And you have obtained that State Pension forecast?

Yes I would get the maximum £12942.89
Thanks for your other suggestion about the small pots. I will certainly be looking into that. Good call.

ian16527

The only other thing I would do (and have done in the past) is cut up your credit cards. 
Once you pay off the debt you don't need them. If you keep them, its so easy to just put a little bit on them again
Good Luck

xylophone

Yes I would get the maximum £12942.89

This is considerably more than the maximum full NSP (£9114.40 per annum) and indicates that pre 2016 you were in a contracted in (SERPS/S2P) pension scheme with your employer/s.

SSTJCKel

ian16527 said:

The only other thing I would do (and have done in the past) is cut up your credit cards. 
Once you pay off the debt you don't need them. If you keep them, its so easy to just put a little bit on them again
Good Luck

Yes i'm with you there. In fact I haven't used my credit cards for the last 3 years apart from when my tv broke just before christmas after a lot of other expense so I only use one for emergencies. And I recently lost faith in them anyway. I was furloughed in the first lockdown and took a payment holiday. Because of that a couple of months ago Barclaycard cancelled my card. This was the one I keep for emergencies. I have never missed a payment and up until furlough I was overpaying (paying more than the minimum by quite a lot) and within a couple of months of getting back to work, last July, I was back to overpaying. I feel that was very harsh so I will keep a different card for emergencies.