Found forgotten Workplace Pension

sometime_soon

Hello. I have recently tracked down a workplace pension that I had paid into for a few years from some while ago. Long story short- Age 55 , self employed sole trader ( for a long time) and only just (rather late) started a SIPP following some great insight on this forum so literally just late navigating & understanding pensions.
The workplace pension states the below which I am not understanding
It has the transfer amount but keeps saying final bonus not guaranteed.
This is with Prudential .

Any insight would be gratefully received as it may also change the tax position now as I maxed out my SIPP in the first year of starting and will be doing the same this year as a higher rate tax payer. I understand may be possible to have carried forward unused years had I remembered I had an old personal pension? I have no idea what type of pension this is to start with though before I even get to whether to transfer into my SIPP now or just leave as is?

What your plan’s worth
Your current transfer value on 18 December 2025 was £xxx

How this has been calculated:
Your current plan value (excluding Final Bonus) £x
Final Bonus (we can’t guarantee this) £22,xxx

DRS1

You have invested in a with profits policy. They come with a base amount payable and guaranteed annual bonuses which can't be taken away and then finally a final bonus which is not guaranteed but will almost certainly be paid - and definitely will be paid if you take your benefits at your selected retirement date.

If you decide to do a transfer then you should watch out for a market value reduction.

ETA These sort of policies sometimes come with something called a guaranteed annuity rate. You should check if yours has one. It can be a valuable thing to have but it can also be an issue with transfers.

Marcon

Any insight would be gratefully received as it may also change the tax position now as I maxed out my SIPP in the first year of starting and will be doing the same this year as a higher rate tax payer. I understand may be possible to have carried forward unused years had I remembered I had an old personal pension? I have no idea what type of pension this is to start with though before I even get to whether to transfer into my SIPP now or just leave as is?

You might indeed be able to use carry forward, so that's worth investigating.

Find out full details, especially whether this has a guaranteed annuity rate. If it does it might be worth keeping for that alone, depending on what the GAR is. If the transfer value is £30K+, and it has a GAR (or anything else classed as a 'safeguarded benefit' - without knowing the type of scheme it's impossible so be sure), then there's a mandatory requirement for you to take regulated advice before you could transfer.

sometime_soon

Thanks for this. Yes the transfer rate is over £30k

Yes it appears it is a with profits fund as below.

This is as much as I have found so far from having just found out and now registered to view the account online. Also given my lack of pension experience!

Your transfer value : This is the amount we’d have paid if you’d transferred your plan on your statement date. The amount isn’t guaranteed If you choose to take money out of your plan or transfer it, we won’t charge you an exit fee.

As I never even remembered it , it’s a bonus either way and at first glance may be best left to run as the assumed age on it was 60 ?
I understand I can take it now at 55 but having just started a SIPP I was trying to max the next 5 years to make up for this lateness!

	Your plan's invested in these funds
Fund name	Number of units at 18	Unit price at 18 December	Fund value at 18 December 2025	Annual management charge	Further costs	Transaction costs
With-Profits Fund	December 2025 N/A	2025 N/A			(See over the page for explanation)
			£xxx	0.89%	0.31%	0.14%
Total

Based on assumptions we've made, the value of the non-protected rights part of your plan on 1 January 2031 could be	£x
If you choose to buy an annuity (guaranteed income for life), you could get a taxable yearly income of	£x
or
You can take a tax-free lump sum of	£x
Plus a taxable yearly income of	£x
Also based on assumptions we've made, the value of your former protected rights part of your plan on 2035 could be	£x
If you choose to buy an annuity (guaranteed income for life), you could get a taxable yearly income of	£x
or
You can take a tax-free lump sum of £x

Marcon

The fact you can take your pension doesn't mean you should…

sometime_soon

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82008972#Comment_82008972

No absolutely. That bit I do understand. We are very late in the day for pensions full stop ( a whole list of reasons and problems) but ultimately it is what it is now so I am trying to just do as much as possible in a short space of time. This is a bonus either way so trying to establish what it was firstly and whether to leave this to run until 60 or transfer to my SIPP given the fees etc in other people’s experience.

Edited to add, Cannot see any specific mention of GAR on annual statement. It just gives an annuity rate but does state for 5 years guaranteed somewhere in all the text. I have requested a pack for further information.

DRS1

A 5 year guarantee is not the same as a GAR. The 5 year guarantee is in case you die shortly after taking the annuity - it is guaranteed to pay out for 5 years from when it started. You can have longer guarantees (up to 30 years) or no guarantee at all.

The GAR is a thing that says if you have a pot of £100 we guarantee the annuity rate will be eg 11% (current rates may be eg 6%) So while a normal annuity would only get you £6 pa per £100 pot the guarantee would get you £11 pa per £100 pot. I think if you had a GAR they might make a bit of a fuss about it in your annual statements.

Of course with modern flexibility there is no need to take an annuity at all - you can do drawdown instead but that may require you to transfer to a more modern pension.

I could be wrong but I don't think the distinction between protected rights and non protected rights actually matters any more.

sometime_soon

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82009010#Comment_82009010

Thankyou. Yes I cannot see any specific GAR so assume it’s not. I would not want annuity anyway and will be doing drawdown on my SIPP so will see what the transfer rate works out at or if it’s just a case of leaving it as is.

Roger175

I also used to have a with-profits pension with Prudential, which I transferred to my SIPP 2 years ago.

The process was very frustrating and took about 4 months from memory. Prudential were awful to deal with. Their staff were generally helpful once you finally got through the long call queuing system, but they were clearly dealing with a slow antiquated system.

I kept getting told by the resident experts on here that it should have been very easy and should have been dealt with using the Origo transfer process, but Prudential insisted this couldn't be used and it was done as a manual transfer.

If you are going to transfer, which you will probably need to do in order to access the pension via drawdown, then allow plenty of time and be prepared for lots of frustration. When the transfer did finally happen, the money was sent in two lumps a day apart which caused more stress as initially I thought I'd misunderstood about the final bonus, but in the end it was all paid out, including the full final bonus. There was a small MVR but I was happy to accept this to get out.

Marcon

Yes I cannot see any specific GAR so assume it’s not.

If there is one and you try to transfer, the provider will soon flag the fact, given your transfer is over £30K.

I kept getting told by the resident experts on here that it should have been very easy and should have been dealt with using the Origo transfer process, but Prudential insisted this couldn't be used and it was done as a manual transfer.

'Kept getting told'? Looking back at the relevant thread, you were told once by @dunstonh that the Pru did use Origo, but he then went on to explain why your transfer might not be entirely plain sailing:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6536277/prudential-proving-to-be-a-nightmare-over-transfer

If you are going to transfer, which you will probably need to do in order to access the pension via drawdown, then allow plenty of time and be prepared for lots of frustration.

…or recognise that a combination of an elderly product, and the hugely regulated environment of today, mean you need to adjust your thought processes. It isn't like transferring a bank account - nothing so simple! The red tape is there to protect consumers - and I've yet to find anyone who has been scammed out of their pension saying that less protection would be a good idea.

Roger175

Marcon

Apologies, if that was the case. It was a process I am still trying to forget. AJBell were also telling me Origo was suitable and I post on other forums also, so my recollection is that everyone except Prudential thought it should have been more straight foreword. Suffice it to say, the process was a a right pain and I was just trying to advise the OP to allow plenty of time.