Questions on Private Pension

tksnota

I’m new on this thread. I have some questions hopefully someone can help me

1. Can someone recommend a company who can trace all my pensions? I used the government sponsored pension tracing but none of my previous employers’ names were shown and I couldn’t remember my pension providers.

2. I’m happy to pay for the tracing service. Can anyone tell me the average the cost?

3. I plan to get the 25% tax free then get the remaining amount yearly below the tax free threshold. Is this approach possible to avoid paying tax.

//tksnota

flaneurs_lobster

You really need to get details of (any) pensions before anyone can advise on the ways they might be accessed.

Brie

Aviva have a pension search service which is free and doesn't mean you then need to use them in any capacity.

As with anything like this the more information you can provide the more successful it will be.  You've tried on your own but they may have more luck or might be able to explain why nothing is found.

you will need

• Your National Insurance number 
• A passport or driving licence as photo ID (if you haven't verified your identity in the past) 
• Your previous addresses and names, if there’s been any change
• Employment details for any pensions you think you may have

Find and Combine | Trace and consolidate your pensions - Aviva

All that said there are lots of reasons you might not find a pension.  If this is some time ago you might have been enrolled in a defined benefit scheme or later a defined contribution scheme but not been with the company long enough to get vested service.  So there would be no record of you being in that company's scheme.  Or you may have been too young to be included.  Or you may have been a contracted employee and so not eligible to join.  BUT it's free so worth trying to see if there's even a small pension lurking somewhere.

On-the-coast

How much of a hurry are you in?

The decade overdue uk pensions dashboard is supposed to be live in October - though they’ve missed every deadline previously announced. 

flaneurs_lobster

On-the-coast said:

How much of a hurry are you in?

The decade overdue uk pensions dashboard is supposed to be live in October - though they’ve missed every deadline previously announced. 

Imagine that, stick your NI Number into a webpage and every single pension that you've ever had will appear.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke

DRS1

I am not sure what period your employment covered and whether you might have been contracted out for some of it but if so then @Marcon's post in this thread and in the linked thread may help

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

LHW99

Have you tried Gretel?

https://www.gretel.co.uk/find-lost-pensions

tksnota

Thanks a lot. I tried Gretel but no data were produced. I will try the Aviva one. 

Marcon

tksnota said:

I’m new on this thread. I have some questions hopefully someone can help me

1. Can someone recommend a company who can trace all my pensions? I used the government sponsored pension tracing but none of my previous employers’ names were shown and I couldn’t remember my pension providers.

2. I’m happy to pay for the tracing service. Can anyone tell me the average the cost?

3. I plan to get the 25% tax free then get the remaining amount yearly below the tax free threshold. Is this approach possible to avoid paying tax.

//tksnota

1. That's quite unusual. If you can remember the names of some (or all!) of your previous employers, and post them here, someone might be able to point you in the right direction.

2. Forget paying. It is highly unlikely to get you any further than the suggestions on this thread. There is no 'average cost' because most such services operate on the basis of a finders fee related to the amount of pension they stumble across while searching.

3. Depends if all your pensions are defined contribution and offer phased drawdown - and if you can afford to live on such a modest income stream. How old are you now and what sort of state pension are you expecting? That alone could soak up the whole of your personal allowance, so this approach would fall at the first hurdle.


One of the first questions I always ask when people are trying to trace 'all their pensions' is: do you have any to find? If you've not been getting any correspondence from any pension providers, and have been fairly static in terms of physical address, that suggests you may not have (m)any to find. What's your work pattern been like - big organisations for reasonably long periods, or lots of short stints with smaller employers? If the latter, you might  not have had a chance to join a workplace pension until auto-enrolment came in - which could have been as late as 2017. Looking at your previous posts, you've obviously had a torrid time financially in recent years, so did you opt out because you needed to save money?

tksnota

I was hit with financial problem but gradually recovering 

My main goal is to get all my private pensions. I managed to get a couple of them but the rest are difficult 

The private pension dashboard is good. Will it show all the pension providers tagged under one’s NI even for a month’s contribution?

Marcon

The pension dashboard is still a long way off. October 2026 is the date by which schemes 'in scope' have to be connected to the dashboard, not the date on which it goes live for general public use. It won't cover all schemes and of course if the data submitted by a provider is incorrect...

You say some of your pensions are 'difficult' - in what way? Maybe if you'd kindly respond to some of the queries I've raised people here could help you now?