Missing funds: There are around 2.8 million missing pensions in the UK worth around £26.6 billion
Savers who think they have lost track of their old pension funds can take advantage of a free search service from Aviva from today.
In the UK, around 2.8 million pensions worth around £26.6 billion have been lost, an increase of 73 per cent in the last four years alone.
Savers often lose track of them when they move house and forget to tell pension providers their new contact details. The typical lost pension is worth around £9,500, according to Aviva.
There are several free tracing services, including an official government one, details of which can be found at gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details.
Aviva’s new Find and Match service aims to go further than most by checking the pots it finds for valuable or protected benefits. Savers who find missing pensions often decide to consolidate them to make them easier to manage.
But in some cases, consolidation will mean sacrificing valuable benefits, for example a loyalty bonus or life insurance.
Some pensions also impose switching fees, which may mean it’s not worth moving forward.
Aviva says it includes all this information in an online pension report. Savers do not need to transfer or combine their pensions with Aviva if they use its tracking service.
Aviva’s Joanne Phillips says: “Investing time today to track down your lost pension could be the best investment you make all year.”