Pensions - has anyone used pension tracing

[ACurlyWurlyTail]

over many years working I am now slowly approaching retirement. I thought about looking at my pensions.
It occurred to me that I had pension plans in place with numerous employers over the years but I have no idea who with
Documents relating to these are long gone, my name and address has changed several times and I have nothing to confirm it. I foolishly thought you would just need you NI number to trace things owed. The Gov website can only help if the employer still exist or you know who the pension was with. I was told about Pensions Advice Uk who do a free search for you.
Has anyone used it and can anyone confirm it is actually free, I dont want to be scammed out of what little pension pot I have found.

https://www.gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details

Use this, definitely free.

Following as this applies to me also. I stupidly thought pensions followed you around from job to job, yes linked to your NI number. So complicated as I know some places I worked are no longer there.

Even if the employer you worked for no longer exists, the pension will still be there somewhere - it’s just a case of tracking it down!

In a few years time it will be as simple as just using your National Insurance number - you will be able to log into a dashboard that will show all the pension rights held by you will all the different companies. This was due to be introduced in around 2025 but the project has been delayed so might not be until 2026 or later now. In the meantime you just need to try and track down your pensions using whatever information you can remember.

You might find that the pension companies contact you - often when someone comes to retirement age and the company doesn’t have contact details they will use a tracing service to find you!

@ChessieFL Sadly, the gov site doesnt have the company listed. it is possible the company used other means of registering or another name as i cant find them on companies house. Thats just one of about 5 i need to track and none are on there

Interesting to see that the database i imagined is happening so it may be just wait and see, I didnt know about them tracing me