Pension advice

[Wildfire]

I will admit to having not really grown up, but of late I have realised I am just not a kid anymore and need to get my pension sorted or at least in some semblance of organised.

Between being messed about by one company and being a contractor I have a few about the place and need some help in getting what I have sorted out.

Can anyone give me a good starting point to tracking down what I have, then working out what is best to do with them?

Do I need an IFA?

[rustyuk]

I used to be a contractor and sorted mine out myself.

First, I opened a SIPP and cashed in all of my small pots from the various perm jobs I had over the years. Then I bought several tracker funds from the usual suspects, Vanguard etc.

Worked well for me.

[Snozzer]

You can use the gov.uk Website to find pension providers linked to your NI number. It's a case of ringing them. Then sign up for a SIPP. Fidelity are safe hands, so invest in some of their top funds.

[simon800]

rustyuk said:

I used to be a contractor and sorted mine out myself.

First, I opened a SIPP and cashed in all of my small pots from the various perm jobs I had over the years. Then I bought several tracker funds from the usual suspects, Vanguard etc.

Worked well for me.

This seems to be the correct answer!

[Wildfire]

Snozzer said:

You can use the gov.uk Website to find pension providers linked to your NI number. It's a case of ringing them. Then sign up for a SIPP. Fidelity are safe hands, so invest in some of their top funds.

Thanks! That's the first step..

[Bannock]

Wildfire said:

Snozzer said:

You can use the gov.uk Website to find pension providers linked to your NI number. It's a case of ringing them. Then sign up for a SIPP. Fidelity are safe hands, so invest in some of their top funds.

Thanks! That's the first step..

That's an interesting one. I thought you needed to know the name of the employer or pension provider to do this? Is there a gov.uk page where you can just enter an NI number and find out which pension providers it's linked to? I ask because I know I've got a pot out there somewhere from an employer which doesn't exist any more, and I have no idea which provider it's held with. I've tried using the tracing service on gov.uk but I've failed to turn anything up.

[VR99]

Snozzer said:

You can use the gov.uk Website to find pension providers linked to your NI number. It's a case of ringing them. Then sign up for a SIPP. Fidelity are safe hands, so invest in some of their top funds.

Hmmm I thought this service wasn't available yet....at least not for DC pensions but I could be wrong. Per the post above I think you would need to have an idea who your employer was and then speak to their HR or admin team to find out the pension scheme administrator e.g: Standard Life, Scottish Widows etc.

As for the SIPP, my view is any of the established players are fine whether it be Vanguard, Fidelity, AJ Bell, II etc OP don't get too bogged down with this, all the names mentioned are decent (I use them all currently) and really comes down to personal preference, convenience and of course platform and fund fees.
I use Fidelity for my SIPP due to an old employer discount but plan to open a Vanguard SIPP for the wife as it does the job and is reasonably cheap for sub £100k portfolios albeit limited to Vanguard funds/ETF's only.