What is the Pension Tracing Service?

16 Apr 2024

The Pension Tracing Service is a free tool provided by the government, designed to help you track down contact information for pension providers that your previous employers may have used. This can be particularly useful if you've lost touch with your old workplace pensions.

How Does It Work?

When you use the Pension Tracing Service, you access a database containing over 200,000 records of both workplace and personal pension schemes. However, it's important to note that this service can only help you find the provider's contact details—it doesn't pinpoint your specific pension directly.

Preparing to Use the Service

To make the most of this service, you'll need to gather some key information beforehand:

  • The name of the previous employer or pension scheme (and any former names)

  • The nature of the business

  • Any changes to the business address during your time with them

Armed with this information, you can start the search for your old pension provider.

Follow-up Actions

After obtaining the necessary contact details from the Pension Tracing Service, you will need to reach out to the pension provider yourself. This might involve communication via phone or mail to confirm whether they hold a pension in your name, learn its current value, and eventually request payouts.

A Simpler Alternative?

While the Pension Tracing Service can be helpful, it can also prove to be a bit cumbersome and time-consuming, especially when you need to contact multiple providers yourself.

If you're looking for an easier, assisted approach to finding and consolidating old pensions, you might want to consider downloading the Penny app. Penny will handle the entire process for you, from contacting your pension providers to transferring them into one personal pension account.

SOME IMPORTANT THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
Pensions are long terms investments. It’s important that you know the value of your investment could go up as well as down. You could get back less than you put in. Past performance is not necessarily a guide to the future and pension investing is not intended to be a short-term option. Penny does not provide financial advice so please be sure that this investment is right for you.

Your current pension might have special benefits that will be lost if you transfer to Penny. These special benefits include: Guaranteed Annuity Rate (GAR), Guaranteed Bonus Rate (GBR), Guaranteed Minimum Pension (GMP) and Protected Tax Free Cash (PFTC) over 25%. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

Your current provider might charge you a transfer-fee to transfer your pension to Penny. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

You should consider the charges and benefits before transferring your old pensions to your new plan, and consider whether the risk and reward profile of the investments offered matches your needs. It may be that your current provider has lower fees than Penny - where this is the case, we recommend that you carefully consider whether to transfer your pension to Penny, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

If you are in any doubt about proceeding you should contact a financial adviser.
© Copyright 2024 Penny Technology Limited. Company registration: 11999643. FCA Reference Number: 931299.
SOME IMPORTANT THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
Pensions are long terms investments. It’s important that you know the value of your investment could go up as well as down. You could get back less than you put in. Past performance is not necessarily a guide to the future and pension investing is not intended to be a short-term option. Penny does not provide financial advice so please be sure that this investment is right for you.

Your current pension might have special benefits that will be lost if you transfer to Penny. These special benefits include: Guaranteed Annuity Rate (GAR), Guaranteed Bonus Rate (GBR), Guaranteed Minimum Pension (GMP) and Protected Tax Free Cash (PFTC) over 25%. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

Your current provider might charge you a transfer-fee to transfer your pension to Penny. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

You should consider the charges and benefits before transferring your old pensions to your new plan, and consider whether the risk and reward profile of the investments offered matches your needs. It may be that your current provider has lower fees than Penny - where this is the case, we recommend that you carefully consider whether to transfer your pension to Penny, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

If you are in any doubt about proceeding you should contact a financial adviser.
© Copyright 2024 Penny Technology Limited. Company registration: 11999643. FCA Reference Number: 931299.
SOME IMPORTANT THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
Pensions are long terms investments. It’s important that you know the value of your investment could go up as well as down. You could get back less than you put in. Past performance is not necessarily a guide to the future and pension investing is not intended to be a short-term option. Penny does not provide financial advice so please be sure that this investment is right for you.

Your current pension might have special benefits that will be lost if you transfer to Penny. These special benefits include: Guaranteed Annuity Rate (GAR), Guaranteed Bonus Rate (GBR), Guaranteed Minimum Pension (GMP) and Protected Tax Free Cash (PFTC) over 25%. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

Your current provider might charge you a transfer-fee to transfer your pension to Penny. If this is the case, we will not transfer your pension, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

You should consider the charges and benefits before transferring your old pensions to your new plan, and consider whether the risk and reward profile of the investments offered matches your needs. It may be that your current provider has lower fees than Penny - where this is the case, we recommend that you carefully consider whether to transfer your pension to Penny, as you may be better off not transferring in these cases.

If you are in any doubt about proceeding you should contact a financial adviser.
© Copyright 2024 Penny Technology Limited. Company registration: 11999643. FCA Reference Number: 931299.