One in six over 55s – 17 per cent – think the pensions dashboard will encourage people to consolidate their pots with different employers, while 29 per cent think it will help them to save more, new research has found.
The research found more than one in five people with multiple pensions – 21 per cent – have lost track of at least one of them, with 62 per cent of Britons having multiple pensions. A significant minority of 39 per cent said they do not know the value of their pensions.
The research found 45 per cent of people think the pension dashboard will give them an up to date value of their savings so far and 35 per cent believe it will help stop people losing track of their pensions.
The research is published as a working pension dashboard prototype is due to be revealed to the public later this week, having been shown to ministers recently.
Aegon UK head of pensions Kate Smith says: “Today people have diverse careers and often numerous jobs through their working lifetime and it’s therefore concerning that a fifth of people have lost track of some of their savings. Planning what your retirement will look like without knowing how much money you have to create a retirement income is near impossible. The pension dashboard should greatly simplify the process of finding lost pensions, as well as providing people with an easy way to view all their pension pots, including the state pension, in one place. However, the dashboard can only be a truly useful tool if all pension schemes and providers are able to adequately digitise and provide the necessary information in a way that the dashboard can display. Otherwise there will be too many missing jigsaw pieces for people to get a clear picture of their savings. The Government must encourage all schemes to ensure their data is ready for the anticipated launch in 2019 and ensure the final product is as useful for customers as it should be.
“Importantly though, people should not feel that they have to wait for the full launch of the dashboard in 2019 to trace their lost pots. The Department of Work and Pensions pension-tracing service already helps people find lost or forgotten pensions they built up many years ago, or speak to a financial adviser.”