More power to your pension!

Feel like you’re playing snakes and ladders and hopscotch at the same time while standing in the middle of a minefield? Sounds like you are trying to sort out your pension – or pensions!

The trouble is that no one stays in the same job forever these days; a ‘job for life’ was something our grandparents had.

If you’ve got several pension pots, you may get a better deal when you start drawing retirement benefits if you combine them. There are rules that may allow you to take small pots as a lump sum, part of which will be taxed.

It can be difficult to keep track of a number of smaller pots and payments and remember that different rules apply to defined benefit schemes – if ever there was a time to make sure you have expert advice it has to be when you are sorting out your pension. But who do you get to advise you? The Pensions Advisory Service (TPAS) is an independent organisation that is grant-aided by the Department for Work and Pensions.

It works to make pensions understandable for everyone, providing independent and impartial information and guidance about pensions, free of charge, to members of the public.

It provides the telephone service for the Government service, Pension Wise and as such does not offer regulated financial advice or provide detailed tax information.

Neither does it deal with complaints or disputes relating to the State Pension.

You can find help from Pension Wise from other organisations like the Citizens Advice Bureau.