How do we find out if my useless husband has any pension savings?

[Largepiecesofcrookedwood]

Just that really...
DH is dyslexic and utterly hopeless with paperwork. He has spent his life relying on the good will of secretaries and for a period of time his somewhat dubiously motivated ex wife (you'd think he would have learnt after that episode )
While I refuse to pander to him do encourage him to make barbers appointments etc himself, I'm resigned to the fact that the bulk of the life admin falls to me and always will.
He's now almost 67 and only recently dropped into conversation that he doesn't think he has a pension
He has paid into several over the years, one when he was an apprentice in the sixties, probably a couple small ones over the years that he would simply have ticked a box to agree to, and more recently (about ten or so years ago) a personal pension set up by the dastardly ex (there's every chance that one is empty though, everything else was)
The problem is that he predictably can't remember which companies they were- at all (beyond "I think it was behind the Co-Op")
The .gov site seems to only work if you know the name of the provider so isn't much help to us. I'm guessing that any that he had would be linked to his NI number so could potentially be traced?
If anyone can offer any advice or tips I would be eternally grateful

Does he have any paperwork at all? Is he in touch with former colleagues who might be better at keeping records? Can he find them om facebook? The govt site seems to work if you have the name of an employer. Can he remember who he worked for?

Not really
I had really hoped there was some sort of PPI type company that would do the work for us for a fee- otherwise it's a question of me doing intensive detective work

Do they not send letters occasionally? My similarly useless dh has stacks of letters, and the state pension. There is something confusing called Nest

Does he have a previous address?

Maybe consider hiring a forensic accountant?

You would think it would be linked to his ni number

It's quite odd that he can't remember the names of companies he worked for. If he was in a managerial position which meant he had a secretary....Has he worked since you have been together? Try most recent first, then try to work back?

Contact the department of social protection in the uk. I'm in Ireland and the department of social protection have access to all your income records. Pension, wages, when you last worked, how many pensions you have, etc. I presume there is an equivalent in the il

It's really very simple all it takes is a phone call :S

Do you mean dss?

Probably dwp but would they know about private pension plans?

www.gov.uk/government/news/new-pension-tracing-service-website-launched

www.gov.uk/personal-pensions-your-rights/get-help

Go online and google pension tracing service... it’s free I think and just need Ni number. This will trace all pension pots. The ex wife couldn’t empty his pension pot without pension sharing order I don’t think? Even then the court have to agree the split. Good luck

That was perhaps a bit confusing bella, he's a tradesman so they were company secretaries, not his own personal one. He's that useless with paperwork he needed to keep them on good terms
As far as past companies go, he's been self employed for periods of time (god knows how)
And no paperwork. Aside from his appalling disregard for paperwork, we suffered a catastrophic flood some years ago that destroyed everything. If he did have anything he certainly didn't after that.

Further advice here:
www.ft.com/content/a6a77406-0e88-11e5-9ae0-00144feabdc0

Argh! That link doesn’t work. I found a page there when I googled ‘how do I find if I had a pension?’

I bet there are masses of unclaimed pensions

Yes they would have everything even stuff you haven't notified them of.

Surely at 65 he should be claiming his state pension is he doing that currently ? If you go to www.gov.uk , look at pensions, enter national insurance number will advise you how much and when to claim etc

The free Gov Pensions tracing service will just tell you who is the administrator for your company pension/s, you then have to ring them and see what, if anything you ve got.
There is a similar named one which will charge you.......

fwiw if anyone opted out of SERPS in the 90s, chances are it was handled by Lloyds via scottish widows, ring SW and ask for MOPs team, i just found i ve 29k sitting in there, had no idea.

Next year they ll be a Pensions Dashboard which will be far more comprehensive but the Gov wants to abandon its launch.

I know this as i ve spent the last month tracing 6 former works pensions :(

Thank you all
DH has deferred his state pension as he's still fit and able to work and doesn't have anything else to live on
I would be lying if I said I'm not inwardly furious about the situation we're potentially in, but what will be will be
Lots of research to be done once the summers over!

May be he should not defer the state pension any more for a start. if his health is poor it may not be a good decision to defer it.

There is a campaign to keep the pensions dashboard mentioned above as I believe the Government recently decided not to go ahead with it by the way.

I am not sure I would marry anyone who is bad with paperwork but he must have had other attractions than financial! He can presumably write to past employers for a start and presumably he knows where he worked. He probably has a right to make a personal data access request too of ex employers which is free of charge and that might help him get the data he needs.

Unless you're a higher rate taxpayer there's no sense in deferring the State Pension - might as well have the money in your hand, etc.
Pension Tracing Service ought to help. Big problem is that so many pensions have been taken over by other companies. So the Co-op Insurance policies are now under Royal London for instance. They should be able to trace if he calls them, with name, date of birth and NI number.

Look at this www.gov.uk/deferring-state-pension/what-you-get however I believe that the defer is only positive for people of a certain age.