Trace pensions from deceased husband

brig001

My friend’s husband died, but as they had been living separately for a number of years, she doesn’t know if he had any pensions and if she is entitled to anything from them. How would you go about this?
Thanks,
Brian

greatkingrat

Is your friend the executor of her husband's estate? If so she should be able to check his bank statements to see if he was getting any pensions other than the state pension.

Marcon

greatkingrat said:

Is your friend the executor of her husband's estate? If so she should be able to check his bank statements to see if he was getting any pensions other than the state pension.

Depends if he was old enough to actually be in receipt of any pension benefits to which he'd built up an entitlement.

OP - does she have any idea of who his previous employers were/are? If so, try https://www.gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details

Were they simply living apart, or judicially separated (i.e. by order of a court)? 

LHW99

A start would be to think about where he worked. If the companies are still in business, contacting them (with his dates of employment if possible|) could bring information about who holds the pension(s) and where.

brig001

Thanks everyone for the replies. In turn:
She isn’t the executor, and his family has shut her out, so it’s difficult to find anything out
They were simply living apart. When she got pregnant, he moved out 
He was old enough to receive pension benefits, and she gets a widow’s pension from the government 
She doesn’t know where he worked unfortunately

xylophone

She isn’t the executor, and his family has shut her out, so it’s difficult to find anything out

It will be the duty of his executor to discover his financial position - this includes any pensions he may have been receiving/was due to receive.

The administrators of the scheme(s) will contact the executor concerning any letters of nomination/wishes and will request details of any dependants (including widow) - it may well be that they will be writing to the widow in due course.

brig001

Hi Xylophone, sorry, missed this
It's been a few years, so I don't think anyone will be writing soon
I guess this means that she wasn't nominated to receive his pension

Thanks,
Brian

Marcon

brig001 said:

Hi Xylophone, sorry, missed this
It's been a few years, so I don't think anyone will be writing soon
I guess this means that she wasn't nominated to receive his pension

Thanks,
Brian

She wouldn't need to be nominated if he'd been in a defined benefit scheme (aka final salary and more recently its little cousin the CARE scheme) - the rules set out who receives a pension, so the executors wouldn't necessarily have investigated the position, especially if there was no paperwork from the scheme/any payments going into his bank account at the time of his death.

Does she by any happy miracle know his NI number?

macman

Was there a will? If so, his financial position will be clear from that (though not his pension entitlement). Get a copy if it exists, it's a public record.
If he died intestate, she would inherit the entire estate if worth less than 270K, so it is worth investigating this.

brig001

Marcon said:
She wouldn't need to be nominated if he'd been in a defined benefit scheme (aka final salary and more recently its little cousin the CARE scheme) - the rules set out who receives a pension, so the executors wouldn't necessarily have investigated the position, especially if there was no paperwork from the scheme/any payments going into his bank account at the time of his death.

Does she by any happy miracle know his NI number?

macman said:

Was there a will? If so, his financial position will be clear from that (though not his pension entitlement). Get a copy if it exists, it's a public record.
If he died intestate, she would inherit the entire estate if worth less than 270K, so it is worth investigating this.

Both good points, thank you
I'll ask her

Brian