Client feedback

“Gillian and Curtis provide an excellent service to the trustees. They are approachable and possess a huge amount of knowledge. Everything appears to work smoothly which I am sure is due to the immense amount of work they do in the background to ensure all paperwork is available and up to date.”

Ian Woods,

KGPT trustees

“PSGS offered the right support at very short notice, at reasonable cost, when we really needed it.”

Ian Edwards,

Chair of Trustee, Comet Pension Scheme

“Many organisations and people provide the services that clients need. In my opinion, the differentiator is in the way those services are provided and to that extent, Kathy embodies the qualities that I have come to value from PSITL. Kathy is organised but not fussy; diligent but not dogmatic; persistent without being pushy and compliant in a pragmatic way. Whilst she takes ownership and drives issues forward, Kathy is a team player who uses her and her colleagues experience to provide services to her trustee client whilst working closely with those like me representing the sponsoring employer. She works collaboratively with advisers but constructively challenges the scope of services, fees and service standards whenever necessary and makes sure that member needs are always taken into account. I enjoy working with her and trust that she will deliver what is required by the trustee and the members they represent in a manner satisfactory to the sponsoring employer. ”

Stuart Barker,

Internal Pensions Consultant, RSPCA

“I wanted to look at the effectiveness of our trustee board, so Gillian, our PSGS scheme secretary, provided their trustee self-assessment tool to help me gather thoughts and opinions from others on the board. The tool was extremely easy to use and asked all the right questions to help me collect the information I needed as Trustee Chair. It is a great example of the way PSGS shares knowledge with their clients and makes dealing with key governance issues easy. As well as enabling me to meet one of the Regulator’s 21st century trusteeship requirements, using the tool has flagged trustee training needs and ways we could improve trustee meetings further. ”

Claire Silvester,

Vector Aerospace

“When requesting information by email, I have noticed that there is 'out of hours activity' to answer me. I regard this as a stand out 'above and beyond' - impressed.”

“Very happy with PSGS as an organisation and that opinion is derived from the performance of those that represent them.”

Sean Hoyle,

Wightlink

National Pension Tracing Day - tell your pension scheme members!

Topic:

Hot topic

Date published:

Thursday, 28 October 2021

Author:

Curtis Mitchell

31 October sees the launch of National Pension Tracing Day, a day founded by one of our group companies, Punter Southall Aspire with the support of Aegon, Legal & General, Standard Life and Scottish Widows. Together they’re calling on the pension industry and trustees to encourage the public to use the extra hour on Sunday to trace lost or forgotten pensions.

What is pension tracing?

Only 1 in 25 owners of a pension plan remember to let their providers know of their new address once they have moved home, which is typically eight times in a lifetime. Another big factor is people changing jobs on average 11 times but forgetting to tell their pension company. This contributes to over £19 billion unclaimed pension pots. For many, finding out where to look for a lost pension can be extremely daunting. The National Pension Tracing Day website has lots of useful resources and reveals many common pension pitfalls to watch out for.

Although it is pension scheme members responsibility to keep providers up to date with their contact details, trustee boards can also help by implementing regular tracing exercises – a great good governance task. This is now easily achieved by third-party administrators having the technical capability and relationships to accomplish this quickly.

Why should members trace their pension?

Their pension is theirs! They’ve earned it and have a right to their pension pot. It can have a significant impact on their life post-retirement. It’s also easier than they might think, they can do it themselves.

This is why it is important to keep in touch with members and remind them to keep their contact details up to date. As trustees, we can publicise this in our member communications and websites so they can trace their pensions.

Personally, I am an advocate for pension tracing all year round and will continue organising regular tracing as well as monthly pensioner existence checks as a matter of good governance. I encourage you to tell your members to use this extra hour on Sunday wisely and also consider regular tracing exercises!

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