Are admin Fees, eating away at my pensions!

dunstonh

It was Skipton (who I have an ISA with) who said they wouldn't even consider transferring my pension if they we're below £10,000 as the transferring fees would so high that it wont be beneficial.

Skipton do not provide advice for anyone with less than £50k.  I suspect you are have been given an unqualified statement by an unqualified individual.

And for future note, banks and building societies are best avoided when seeking advice.    In general, they have a woeful track record when it comes to quality and pricing.

ewaste

Just to note that if you were a member of The People's Pension before the 4th of November 2021, then last I checked, you'll have a Protected Pension Age of 55. This might be of some value to you in the future. 

gm0

What @ewaste says is a good example of not rushing to action

There is no rush with DIY pension consolidation (or instructing a consolidator to do it for you).  Yes there can be marginal gains to be had on fees.  Yes they add up over 20 years or more.  And this is not to be ignored. 

But

First it is important to understand what is, or is not, special (from earlier rules) about each scheme you already have. 

DC pensions without any special features e.g. Protected Pension age - can be swept up to whatever company you prefer, to invest in whatever you prefer, at a cost you are prepared to shop around for. Or perhaps you put up with lesser digital facilities and possibly less responsive support service if you ever need to talk to them - in return for lower costs from a "low cost" positioned provider such as an iWeb.

To understand features - you need to read the scheme booklets and to have grasped some of the jargon so that the booklets make sense.

You also need to grasp that personalised financial advice is a product in and of itself. 
Separate from providing a pension tax wrapper, and investment platform to you. 
Sold separately to people that want it - bundled usually with setting you up on the underlying one. 

And priced from a market of small independents. 1-2% up front to set you up and 0.5% per year for ongoing (this plus/minus a bit with size, or capped). There are a whole range of tied advice providers (FAs) - Pru, Banks, Wealth Managers who will charge double or treble (or more than) this amount - for much the same FCA regulated service - and yet only sell their own in house product. They don't shop around for you. You pay more for less. 
And not in any meaningful sense - better.  No promises will be forthcoming from any advice about performance of the investments.   Only that they are suitable ones for someone like you to take risk on.   Many people find this surprising.  But is it is legal and how this "advice" market works in the UK today.

Caveat Emptor

Albermarle

Raqx92 said:

Thanks so much for the advice everyone, I've only just started really looking into my pensions so it's all super helpful and much appreciated. You're right @gm0 the information has not been the easiest to digest but I'm feeling a bit more reassured that transfer fees aren't necessarily the norm for most pension focused companies so, I probably just need to shop around a bit more.

It was Skipton (who I have an ISA with) who said they wouldn't even consider transferring my pension if they we're below £10,000 as the transferring fees would so high that it wont be beneficial. (Or at least that's what I took from the conversation). Perhaps as a building society they've different polices so I think I'll stick with one of the companies I already have a pension with or that specialise in the area. I've never heard of Hargreaves but I'll look into them seeing as people are recommending them. 

R

I think Skipton only offer pensions etc where you have to go through their advice people, rather just set one up online as you can with many others.

Hargreaves Lansdown are an investment platform that deal directly with the public. Where you can invest via a pension, via a S&S ISA, or outside of those. They have thousands of investments to choose from and are a FTSE 100 listed company.
Being the biggest and best known they have the highest charges, but a good website and good customer service.
Their main competitors are .
Fidelity Personal Investing
AJ Bell
Vanguard 
+ ,many others.
Or you can look at a more traditional pension provider like
Standard Life
Aviva
Scottish Widows
+ many others.