The lost pension pot

Reacting to

PPI reveals scale of UK’s £18.7bn lost pensions problem (Money Marketing, 12 October 2026)

A Self Assessment return names every employer a client worked for in a tax year. Read across several years of returns, a change of employer marks the point an old workplace pension was likely opened, and then left behind when the next job started. The Pensions Policy Institute has now put a number on that gap at national scale.

What the research found

The PPI’s Lost Pensions: The scale of the challenge, published 12 October 2026 and supported by the Money and Pensions Service, as reported by Money Marketing:

3m+

pension pots remain lost across the UK.

£18.7bn

total value sitting in those lost pots.

£6,220

average value of a lost pension pot.

82%

of the lost value sits in pots belonging to people under 55.

Pensions Policy Institute, Lost Pensions: The scale of the challenge, 12 October 2026

The PPI also found a gap by sex: the average lost pot for men is £6,830, against £5,370 for women. The PPI gives three reasons for the overall pattern: automatic enrolment created many more small pots than existed before it started, job changes happen more often earlier in a career, and pension rules restrict access before the normal minimum pension age, which is 55 now and rises to 57 on 6 April 2028 under the Finance Act 2022. None of the three describes a choice the saver made.

Where the gap shows up in the file

A client’s historic Self Assessment returns name every employer and give the PAYE reference for each one, for every tax year the client was employed. Three employers across eight years is three possible workplace pensions, some of which may have closed when the job ended. A change of employer across several years of returns already sits in the file the practice holds; no new information has to be gathered to see it.

The same pattern applies to a client who left employment for self-employment, or for a directorship of their own company: the returns from the years before that move still name the employer, or employers, that came before.

Pensions Policy Institute, 12 October 2026: more than three million pension pots worth at least £18.7 billion are lost across the UK, with an average value of £6,220 a pot.

A worked example

This example uses a made-up client and made-up figures.

The client has been self-employed as a consultant since 2019. The returns on file show three earlier years of employment before that: one employer from 2014 to 2016, a second from 2016 to 2018, and a third role for three months in early 2019, before the consultancy began. Using the PPI’s reported average lost pot value of £6,220, three unclaimed workplace pensions from that period could hold around £18,660 between them.

The consultant’s employment history

Made-up client and made-up figures

Employer 1, 2014 to 2016possible pension

Employer 2, 2016 to 2018possible pension

Employer 3, three months in 2019possible pension

Estimated value at the PPI’s reported average£18,660

The government’s Pension Tracing Service is a free search. It needs only an employer’s or provider’s name, which already sits in the PAYE references on the returns filed for the client. It does not confirm whether a pension exists or state its value; it gives contact details so the client can ask the scheme directly. An accountant pointing a client to it is not giving regulated advice.

Accountancy work

Noticing a change of employer across several years of returns, and mentioning it to the client, is accountancy work done with information already on file.

Regulated advice

Deciding whether to consolidate a pot that is found, and what to do with the money, is regulated advice, and sits with the Equity & General financial planner.

The division is set out in who does what.

Checks to run this week

Scan the employment pages of returns filed for a client over the past ten years. An employer who no longer appears is a candidate for a pension that was opened and left behind.
Point the client to the government’s Pension Tracing Service with the employer’s name. The name is already on file. If a pot is confirmed, ask whether the client would like an introduction to the Equity & General financial planner to decide what to do with it.

What is not yet settled

The PPI had not published the full Lost Pensions report alongside the headline figures; the £18.7 billion and £6,220 average come from the research as reported by Money Marketing on 12 October 2026, and that coverage did not state the survey’s methodology or sample size. The MoneyHelper Pensions Dashboard, meant to let a saver see every pension in one place, including ones they have lost touch with, is expected in financial year 2027/28; no fixed launch date has been confirmed.

Common questions

Can an accountant trace a client's lost pension?

An accountant can point a client to the government’s Pension Tracing Service, a free search that needs only an employer’s or provider’s name. That name is already on file in the PAYE references on past tax returns, so nothing extra has to be gathered. The service gives contact details for the scheme; it does not confirm whether a pension exists or state its value, so the client still has to ask the scheme directly. Deciding what to do once a pot is confirmed, including whether to consolidate it with other pensions, is a regulated activity, and it sits with the Equity & General financial planner the accountant can introduce the client to, with their consent.

What in the file points to an old pension?

A change of employer. The employment pages of a Self Assessment return name every employer a client worked for in that tax year, with the PAYE reference for each one. Three different employers across several years of returns is three possible workplace pensions, some of which may have closed when the job ended. None of this needs new information from the client; it is already recorded in the returns prepared for them each year they held employment alongside, or before, running their own business.

Why do pension pots get lost in the first place?

The Pensions Policy Institute names three reasons in its research: automatic enrolment created many more small pots than existed before it started, job changes happen more often earlier in a career, and pension rules restrict access before the normal minimum pension age, which is 55 now and rises to 57 on 6 April 2028 under the Finance Act 2022. None of the three describes a choice the saver made. A pot opened automatically through one employer and left behind when the next job started is the pattern the research describes, and it is the pattern visible in a tax return that names a new employer each time a pot would have opened.

What if the client cannot remember the pension scheme?

The Pension Tracing Service does not need a scheme name or a policy number. An employer’s or provider’s name is enough to start a search, and the accountant’s file of past returns can rebuild the list of employers to search against, one tax year at a time: the employment pages of each return name the employer, and the dates the client worked there narrow down which year to start from. The service supplies contact details for the client to write or call. It does not say whether a pension exists or what it holds; the client finds that out by contacting the scheme directly, once the search has given them somewhere to write to.

How does this connect to the pension and inheritance tax changes?

From 6 April 2027, most unused pension funds and death benefits count in a person’s estate for inheritance tax, under the Finance Act 2026 and HMRC’s technical note Inheritance Tax on pensions, published 11 May 2026. Tracing a pot now lets the client and the financial planner decide what happens to it while the client is able to act. From 6 April 2027 an untraced pot is still counted as part of the taxable estate, whether or not the executor knows it exists. The detail of that change is set out separately in when the pension joins the estate.