Opted out of Serps pension

[HappyStep1]

Hi,
Many years ago, a teenager, I was badly advised/coerced into taking an opt out pension.
I'm now in my fifties and the pension is practically worthless.
I thought I had heard that you can claim some compensation for this as it was clearly missold but don't want to use some claims company that will want a chunk of it.
Does anyone know if there is a chance I can claim and how I would go about it?
Thanks

On what basis do you feel that you missold?
You would need a clear basis for a complaint / compensation claim. Feeling that you were missold is not justification in itself.
Any pension redress would most likely be paid into you pension, and not as 'cash'

I was also told to opt out of serps when I was 19. is it bad? I have no idea how to find out!

Mines done really well. How much is yours worth - it must have made some money over 30 years!

I am sure that this would be something that would be on Martin Lewis' website?

You didn't know it then but since the new flat rate state pension was introduced and given your age you have the opportunity to qualify for a full state pension and have the private pension where your NI contributions/rebates went to on top of it.
If you had stayed in SERPS you would have only got the state pension.
Rather than wanting to complain about it you should be thanking whoever advised you to opt out.

I was also contracted out of serps and it has done badly versus staying in - I lose £26 a week of state pension though its got time to improve I guess. If it grows at 5% a year until I retire it will equal the amount from serps. I can also pay for an additional 6 years to replace the serps years, think its about £800 per year you buy. Or if you work 6 more years its free.

From this I don't think you can claim as it is geared towards the over 40s at time advised.

www.profilepensions.co.uk/blogs/missold-serps-pension#:~:text=Opting%20out%20of%20SERPS%20meant,to%20pay%20less%20National%20Insurance.

@HappyStep1

Hi, Many years ago, a teenager, I was badly advised/coerced into taking an opt out pension. I'm now in my fifties and the pension is practically worthless. I thought I had heard that you can claim some compensation for this as it was clearly missold but don't want to use some claims company that will want a chunk of it. Does anyone know if there is a chance I can claim and how I would go about it? Thanks

Two different things there. Firstly, it was generally NOT bad advice to "opt out" of the state pension scheme whether it was SERPS or S2P. Opting out was standard advice/practice at the time and for most people that decision has worked out well. For you to claim compensation against your adviser at the time would require you to be able to demonstrate that they gave you bad advice in that "general advice" followed by most at that time was, for some reason, not suitable for your personal/particular circumstances.

The second point is that whether the advice at the time was right or not, some pension funds have performed a lot better than others. Again, there may not be a compensation claim due because for some poorly performing pension funds, it really was just luck of the draw rather than incompetence etc. With all forms of long term investment, there are winners and losers, through no fault of their own. To make a claim against the adviser, you have to demonstrate that your adviser put you in the wrong kind of investment vehicle/fund, or to make a claim against the fund managers, you'd have to prove they were negligent/fraudulent, etc.

So, there are no "automatic" rights to seek compensation. Plenty of people have done very well out of opting out. It certainly wasn't some kind of thing to be avoided at that time. Unfortunately, circumstances later on, such as changes to pension scheme rules (both state and private) by successive governments have affected their performance, but that's not something you can sue your adviser for!