Pension tracing

[RichA]

Anyone had any luck tracking down old pensions they paid into many years ago?

I know that I paid into the scheme of a company I worked for in the early 90s but I haven't retained any records. They have no record of me now and neither do the pension providers that the Gov.uk pension tracer led me to after a search for the company name.
Grateful for any insight or suggestions.

 

[Hobbit]

HMRC will have a record of you working there. If pension contributions were compulsory you might be able to ‘reverse’ calculate them by knowing how much tax & NI you paid.

 

[RichA]

HMRC will have a record of you working there. If pension contributions were compulsory you might be able to ‘reverse’ calculate them by knowing how much tax & NI you paid.

I spoke to the HMRC pension advice line today.
They began by referring me to the pension schemes of the company (which I had already traced and spoken to without luck).
Then they referred me to the Gov.uk website, which had already pointed me to them.
Then they gave me a phone number that goes to a dead line.

 

[Canfordhacker]

Rich - I have been through the same path as you and come to a dead end, so i will be watching this hoping for a genius suggestion from the collective experience on here...

 

[road2ruin]

I spoke to the HMRC pension advice line today.
They began by referring me to the pension schemes of the company (which I had already traced and spoken to without luck).
Then they referred me to the Gov.uk website, which had already pointed me to them.
Then they gave me a phone number that goes to a dead line.

If you really get stuck have you looked at someone like AJ Bell who claim that they can track down any old pensions although you do have to set up a pension account with them. I guess, if successful, it's better than not having them!

 

[RichA]

If you really get stuck have you looked at someone like AJ Bell who claim that they can track down any old pensions although you do have to set up a pension account with them. I guess, if successful, it's better than not having them!

Thanks. I haven't. This afternoon I've set up a search account with Gretel, so I'll see if that produces anything.
Nice if there was a central database of pensions that maybe used some kind of 9-digit alphanumerical code unique to each tax payer and was easy to search. They're all pretty efficient at knowing how much I've earned and how much I owe. Not so good when it's the other way around.

 

[Deleted member 36742]

How long were you a member of the scheme?

If it was a short term you may have received a refund of your contributions and, therefore, would not be due benefits from that scheme.

 

[RichA]

How long were you a member of the scheme?

If it was a short term you may have received a refund of your contributions and, therefore, would not be due benefits from that scheme.

Fair comment and something I've thought about.
It was 30+ years ago when I was in my early 20s and not thinking about the future. I worked for this company for about 2.5 years and knew that pension contributions were being taken from my pay. When I left to start the job I've been doing for the last 30 years I was skint, so I believe a refund of a couple of thousand £ would have been memorable. I think that my membership of the scheme for over 2 years also means that the contributions would be kept and the pension continued to exist, albeit with no further contributions. But I could be wrong.

 

[nickjdavis]

Fair comment and something I've thought about.
It was 30+ years ago when I was in my early 20s and not thinking about the future. I worked for this company for about 2.5 years and knew that pension contributions were being taken from my pay. When I left to start the job I've been doing for the last 30 years I was skint, so I believe a refund of a couple of thousand £ would have been memorable. I think that my membership of the scheme for over 2 years also means that the contributions would be kept and the pension continued to exist, albeit with no further contributions. But I could be wrong.

When I started consolidating some of my old small pension pots around 2012 I was aware of a scheme that I contributed to for a similarly short time from 1988 until 1990...so only 2 years. When I left the firm in 1990 I never transferred the pension and largely forgot about it.

When I finally traced the fund (which had changed administrators more than once) the value was around £35k.

So I'd say its definitely worth pursuing.

 

[KenL]

Anyone had any luck tracking down old pensions they paid into many years ago?

I know that I paid into the scheme of a company I worked for in the early 90s but I haven't retained any records. They have no record of me now and neither do the pension providers that the Gov.uk pension tracer led me to after a search for the company name.
Grateful for any insight or suggestions.

Wow! I assumed if you left a pension scheme that you would get an annual statement or at least some way for you to trace it. I get an Annual statement from my civil service style one that I left in 2006.

 

[KenL]

Fair comment and something I've thought about.
It was 30+ years ago when I was in my early 20s and not thinking about the future. I worked for this company for about 2.5 years and knew that pension contributions were being taken from my pay. When I left to start the job I've been doing for the last 30 years I was skint, so I believe a refund of a couple of thousand £ would have been memorable. I think that my membership of the scheme for over 2 years also means that the contributions would be kept and the pension continued to exist, albeit with no further contributions. But I could be wrong.

If memory serves me right, you could not get cash back from a pension that you paid into for more than 2 years.

 

[Deleted member 36742]

Fair comment and something I've thought about.
It was 30+ years ago when I was in my early 20s and not thinking about the future. I worked for this company for about 2.5 years and knew that pension contributions were being taken from my pay. When I left to start the job I've been doing for the last 30 years I was skint, so I believe a refund of a couple of thousand £ would have been memorable. I think that my membership of the scheme for over 2 years also means that the contributions would be kept and the pension continued to exist, albeit with no further contributions. But I could be wrong.

I have been retired for 16 years (formerly an Employee Benefits Consultant) so my memory may not be serving me well but I seem to recall that the limit was 5 years rather than 2 in those days.