There are now an estimated 3.3 million lost pots waiting to be claimed in the UK, worth a mighty £31.1 billion, according to research from the Pensions Policy Institute.

Might you have a pension pot sitting somewhere, waiting for you to claim it? New figures show that – despite all of the publicity around lost pension pots over the last few years – the number going unclaimed has actually risen… up to 3.3 million from 2.8 million just two years ago.

In that time, the value of these pots has also moved up – from £26bn two years ago to £31.1 billion today.

The government’s free Pension Tracing Service is there to help people track down lost
pensions, and demand is growing, with 31,505 calls made to the service between 1 January and 24 May this year… but this is plainly still scratching the surface. The move towards a Pensions Dashboard and pots for life will help when it arrives but it’s going to be a few years before they will be in place.

Says Helen Morrissey, head of retirement analysis, Hargreaves Lansdown: “Keeping a pot for life will make it far easier to keep track of and boost engagement as
members can see their pension grow in one place rather than having a fragmented picture through scattered pensions.”

Until then, they have these top tips:

1          Make a list of everywhere you have worked during your career so far and check to
see if you have pension paperwork for all of them.

2          Talk to any old colleagues to see whether they kept any of the paperwork. If you’re no longer in touch, LinkedIn can be a really useful place to find them.

3          If you have lost details of an old pension scheme, contact the government’s tracing service on Find pension contact details – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). It won’t tell you how much is in the   pension, but it will help you find contact details.

4          You need the name of the company you worked for, the name of the pension
scheme, or the name of the pension provider.

5          You can call the Pension Tracing Service on 0800 731 0193 – Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.

6          Whenever you move home, it is worth adding pension providers to the list of people you need to notify so they have up to date contact details for you and you don’t miss
out on important communications.

Once you’ve tracked down your pensions you may wish to consolidate them. This will give you a better idea of what you have and can improve retirement decision making.
However, before you do so you should check you aren’t incurring any exit fees or missing out on valuable benefits such as guaranteed annuity rates that could boost
your income. It’s also worth saying it rarely make sense to transfer a defined benefit pension.