Reassure Pension

JanO_2

I opted out of SERPS back in the 80's/90's and then opted back in when advised.  This money was put into a pension with HSBC which kept getting sold on and ended up with Reassure.  As I took early requirement and reached 55 in September last year I requested most of the money in January and opted to keep £10,000 in a retirement fund with Reassure so that I wouldn't be paying 40% tax this year.  I have not received my lump sum even though they said it would take 4 weeks and now they are claiming that my pension was closed in early February and moved to a retirement fund called Windsor Life held by Reassure in Romford.  I phone Romford and they have no records of this and say that this retirement fund hasn't existed in years.  Now I am in limbo with no-one seeming to know where the money is and the deadline of 5 April looming.  Has anyone else had something similar happen, and if so, how was it resolved?

dunstonh

This money was put into a pension with HSBC which kept getting sold on and ended up with Reassure.

HSBC sold its life and pensions book to ReAssure.  So, it only moved once.

I have not received my lump sum even though they said it would take 4 weeks and now they are claiming that my pension was closed in early February and moved to a retirement fund called Windsor Life held by Reassure in Romford. 

Windsor Life is one of the brands owned by ReAssure and hasn't been used for years.

This is purely a guess but when transfers of pensions take place using the Origo transfer system, the legacy company name is used as a way to differentiate between the different parts of the company.   So, if they had to move your original HSBC plan to one that supported drawdown functionality, they would still use the Origo system to transfer it, even with internal transfers.  So, someone that doesn't know the system may see something along the lines of "transferred to Windsor Life".   

You need to go back to ReAssure and ask them the status and if they cannot answer, ask them to transfer you to the complaints team.

JanO_2

Dear Dunstonh, thank you for your response.  That would make sense.  I will send a message to the complaints team.