Trying to find out who I opted out of SERPS with in 1987 to 1988

scro

How do I find out who I opted out of serps with and if I can get any money from it

Thanks
Susan

TadleyBaggie

Who were you working for in 1987/88?

scro

I was working for R Twinings in North Shields 

Silvertabby

Even if you left after 1 April 1988 it is likely that you would have needed at least 2 years of membership to be eligible for actual pension benefits.

If less than 2 years, can you remember being offered a refund of your pension contributions after you left?

Marcon

Silvertabby said:

Even if you left after 1 April 1988 it is likely that you would have needed at least 2 years of membership to be eligible for actual pension benefits.

If less than 2 years, can you remember being offered a refund of your pension contributions after you left?

I think this sounds like an 'appropriate' personal pension which was funded by minimum payments ie OP paid full NI contributions, part of which were rebated to her personal pension, so vesting would have been immediate - no minimum period of membership required, and no actual payments required other than the NI rebate, so nothing would have gone through OP's bank account. 

scro said:

How do I find out who I opted out of serps with and if I can get any money from it

Thanks
Susan

OP - does what I've said above to Silvertabby ring any bells? I've added some explanatory text - she'll know what the pensions shorthand means, but doubt many others will! If so, I'd expect this to have taken place in 1988, when personal pensions first became available.

Try this: https://www.tax.service.gov.uk/shortforms/form/DPU_SAR_NI?_ga=2.230026460.1544670040.1621021753-1315656139.1609178084

To understand why, you need to plough through some of this thread https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6267734/is-there-a-really-detailed-online-method-to-check-nics/p1 Sorry it's so long - and there are no post numbers to which I can refer, but let me quote from one of my own posts from June 2021 to explain:

'What makes really interesting reading is the Scheme Membership section at the back of the pack. There's a complete history of all the pension schemes to which I've belonged/contributed - including their reference numbers. Anyone trying to track down one of the many rebate-only Appropriate Personal Pensions***  available from 1988 on would do well to apply for their NI breakdown covering the years when they think they might have taken out such a policy and look for what I hope will prove to be the magic words: 

'Our reference number for your Personal Pension Scheme's certificate authorising it to accept minimum contributions from you is [you'll see a number beginning with A, followed by some digits]'

***   'Appropriate' was the bit of jargon for a personal pension used by an individual before 6 April 2012 to contract out of the State Second Pension on the basis of National Insurance rebates. An NI rebates was where someone paid full rate NI and the difference between that and the lower contracted out rate of NI was paid (or 'rebated') direct to the personal pension provider.'


If my comment above to Silvertabby is correct, then once you have a response to your SAR, you need to contact HMRC (not DWP) with the reference number for your Appropriate Pension and they will be able to confirm who the provider is.

xylophone

It's not impossible that the OP was a member of a contracted out pension scheme through Twinings/Associated British Foods.

Certainly ABF ran such a scheme.