Cashing in a pointless pension

brewerscottage

The FSA decided I was mis-sold my Prudential personal pension and with their help, a substantial fund value was transferred into my current employers occupational scheme.
This has left a small amount in the original, now dormant fund which will not yield a significant pension when I retire (in a minimum of 13 years if at age 55 - some hope!).
The transfer value is just over £12K - is there a way i can get my hands on this money now or do I have to wait until I'm 55?

dunstonh

£12,000 is not pointless. It is still growing each year and there is nothing wrong with that. You have 23 years until you are 65 so that has good potential for growth.

You cannot cash it in ever. Your options are:
1 - keep it as it is
2 - transfer it to another pension (which can include your occ scheme)

brewerscottage

Many thanks for the advice DunstonH. As I am adequately provided for in retirement (A point obviously beyond BigBloke45 and his accusatory tone that I'm some sort of state benefit scrounger), I could make the cash work harder for me now and was hoping there was some way of realising this.
If I can transfer it to my occupational pension, why was this not offered as an an option at the time the original lost benefits were transferred after the FSA ruling? I'm sure Prudential told me at the time it couldn't be done.

averageguy11

Bigbloke i didnt think people who asked questions on here deserve to be judged over by the likes of u..imho

bigbloke45

What did I say?

dunstonh

I could make the cash work harder for me now and was hoping there was some way of realising this.

You can still do this. If you feel the investment potential is not enough for your risk profile then transfer it to a pension that gives you the investment options you want. Typically these would be personal pensions or SIPPs.

If I can transfer it to my occupational pension, why was this not offered as an an option at the time the original lost benefits were transferred after the FSA ruling? I'm sure Prudential told me at the time it couldn't be done.

Before stakeholder pensions, the charges on transfers were high. In 2001, Pru removed the transfer penalty on most of their pensions so at that point it became a viable option.