I worked at a large multinational company for about a year, ending in October 2020 and contributed to the pension scheme (managed by another company), including making overpayments.
In February/March 2021, the pension scheme company contacted me about getting a lump sum refund, or transferring to my new employer's scheme. I initially got the impression I had to do one or the other, and told them that I would like to stay in the existing scheme if possible, and if that was not possible, to transfer to the NEST pension I have with my new employer.
This week I received a payslip from my old company, giving a full refund on my pension and "gross-up" [which I assume means the top-up/overpayments] - which is the opposite of what I wanted. Receiving this would mean losing thousands of pounds to tax and NI, according to the payslip - as getting all that money back at once would be subject to a higher tax bracket I assume. I would be worse off than if I hadn't contributed in the first place.
I have emailed the pension company, forwarding my email from March to show that I did not want a lump sum. I have contacted the Pensions Regulator/Ombudsman and I'm trying to find the email from my old employer's HR/payroll to stop the payment.
Is there anything else I can or should do? If the payment gets made as a lump sum, is there any way I can return/refund it or transfer it to my new pension scheme? It feels really gutting to effectively throw away that money when I tried to do the sensible thing with and put in the pension. Thanks in advance.