Ex-employer being very very slow paying pension?

BigYinUK

Hi. I'm having quite an issue with my ex-employer paying my pension.  I retired in August and have only just received my first monthly payment.  Of the lump sum, which is quite a significant amount, there is no sign  

Just wondering what you folks think?  Is this really bad form, is there anyone who I can contact to push this forward?  

Should I be compensated financially?

Regards 

horsewithnoname

There must be some kind of complaint procedure? Try looking for a website for the pension provider and looking on their. Ultimately there’s the ombudsman, but you have to go through the company complaint system first. 

flaneurs_lobster

I've put three pensions into payment this year, two DB and one DC that I used to buy an annuity. Three different pension admin companies (the usual biggies) and a forth as annuity supplier. Started the process early August and the last to start paying out was late November. Lump sums arrived towards the end of the process.

From comments on here and elsewhere, about three months seems to be the sort of timescale you might expect for this kind of transaction, assuming you are up-to-date with contact and pension details.

squirrelpie

BigYinUK said:

is there anyone who I can contact to push this forward? 

Probably, but unless you tell us who the employer is and who the pension provider is and what type of pension it is, nobody's going to be able to help much.

Brie

Like @flaneurs_lobster I'm putting my pensions into payment though for me it's 1 DB & 2 DCs.  The DB was easy and was done with astonishing speed. 

The DCs are taking forever because 1 administrator insists on sending everything by email despite me telling them every time I cannot open their zipped files.  So while I started in August looking at getting annuities set up I still haven't progressed things. 

What amazes me is that all 3 pensions are administered by the same company (WTW) and yet things are done so badly by some portions of it.  Having worked in the industry myself I know that teams within WTW will work on different pensions as some of the companies it's supporting will have multiple pensions depending on when and where their employees actually worked.  And then, as with any company, you are dependent on having competent customer service being provided by whatever individuals are working there.  

dunstonh

Just wondering what you folks think?  Is this really bad form, is there anyone who I can contact to push this forward?  

Insufficient information to go on.

1) when was your final payroll payment?
2) when did you complete the forms?
3) what type of pension is it? 
4) what type of retirement income is it?

penners324

Brie said:

Like @flaneurs_lobster I'm putting my pensions into payment though for me it's 1 DB & 2 DCs.  The DB was easy and was done with astonishing speed. 

The DCs are taking forever because 1 administrator insists on sending everything by email despite me telling them every time I cannot open their zipped files.  So while I started in August looking at getting annuities set up I still haven't progressed things. 

What amazes me is that all 3 pensions are administered by the same company (WTW) and yet things are done so badly by some portions of it.  Having worked in the industry myself I know that teams within WTW will work on different pensions as some of the companies it's supporting will have multiple pensions depending on when and where their employees actually worked.  And then, as with any company, you are dependent on having competent customer service being provided by whatever individuals are working there.  

Get a zip extractor. Not hard 

cloud_dog

Brie said:

Like @flaneurs_lobster I'm putting my pensions into payment though for me it's 1 DB & 2 DCs.  The DB was easy and was done with astonishing speed. 

The DCs are taking forever because 1 administrator insists on sending everything by email despite me telling them every time I cannot open their zipped files.  So while I started in August looking at getting annuities set up I still haven't progressed things. 

What amazes me is that all 3 pensions are administered by the same company (WTW) and yet things are done so badly by some portions of it.  Having worked in the industry myself I know that teams within WTW will work on different pensions as some of the companies it's supporting will have multiple pensions depending on when and where their employees actually worked.  And then, as with any company, you are dependent on having competent customer service being provided by whatever individuals are working there.  

Assuming you run a Windows system download 7-zip, it is free and unzips almost anything.

Pat38493

Brie said:

Like @flaneurs_lobster I'm putting my pensions into payment though for me it's 1 DB & 2 DCs.  The DB was easy and was done with astonishing speed. 

The DCs are taking forever because 1 administrator insists on sending everything by email despite me telling them every time I cannot open their zipped files.  So while I started in August looking at getting annuities set up I still haven't progressed things. 

What amazes me is that all 3 pensions are administered by the same company (WTW) and yet things are done so badly by some portions of it.  Having worked in the industry myself I know that teams within WTW will work on different pensions as some of the companies it's supporting will have multiple pensions depending on when and where their employees actually worked.  And then, as with any company, you are dependent on having competent customer service being provided by whatever individuals are working there.  

Assuming that you have the relevant software to unzip files generally, some pension administrators password protect the files - if they do that, they should have told you by email what the password is - for example they might say it's your post code followed by your birth date or whatever.  Mercer I think it is usually birthdate followed by post code followed by a symbol (maybe an ! ) with no spaces.

Installing file unzipper should be pretty easy on most devices.

BigYinUK

All my other DB pensions started really quickly - I contacted the trustees, received a payment form, selected the option I wanted, put in my bank details, sent the form back etc and Bob's your uncle, a month later payment arrived.  This one, I'd been writing to the firm since July as I'd not had a statement for years, absolutely nothing heard until October.  Form eventually arrived, I selected a larger lump sum, smaller monthly payment.  TBH I'd expect the lump sump to be paid with the first monthly amount but instead, deadly silence.  They are setting it up now supposedly but I've asked for a timescale and am still waiting for a reply.  Its the trustees at my old firm that are dragging their heels by the look of it.   The actually scheme is with Scottish Widows but despite the fact that they're paying me, they can't find any record of me on their systems!  I left the firm and "retired" years ago!

Hoenir

If you only started the process in July. That would explain the delay in processing. Large organisations generally  work on a 3 month lead time.