6 ways to take control of your pensions in 2025

If you're still many years away from retirement, planning how you'll fund it might not feel like a priority among all the other demands on your time and money.

But taking a few simple steps now can help set you up for a brighter financial future. 

Here are six things to do to get the most out of your pension savings.

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1. Check if your savings are on track

To ensure that you save enough for retirement, you'll need to have a rough idea of how much you need.

To make this easier, the Pension and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA) has developed three ‘retirement living standards’. These reflect the amounts you’d need for what it describes as a minimum, moderate and comfortable standard of living in retirement.

For a comfortable standard of living in retirement, the PLSA says single-person households need £43,100 a year, while couples need £59,000.

Use our pension calculator to give you an idea of how much your pensions will give you in retirement and what that might mean in terms of annual income. 

• Find out more: How much will I need to retire?

2. Combine your pots

Thanks to auto-enrolment, employees are automatically signed up to their workplace pension scheme, meaning many of us will accumulate multiple pots as we switch jobs during our career.

You can make it easier to keep track of your retirement savings by bringing together some or all of your pots in the same place. 

It can also save you money if you're transferring to a scheme with lower fees.

If you're an experienced investor, opting for a self-invested personal pension (Sipp) will give you more control over your savings and access to a wider choice of investments. 

• Find out more: Should I combine my pensions?

3. Update your information

Losing track of your pensions is more common than you might think. 

According to a recent estimate by The Pensions Policy Institute, 3.3m pension pots totalling £31.1bn have become separated from their owners.

Check the details your pension provider(s) hold about you are correct by logging into your online account or checking your latest paper statement.

The free Pension Tracing Service operated by the government has a register of all workplace schemes. This will give you the name and contact details of the provider of an employer's scheme, so you can contact them directly.

Make sure you've completed a nomination of beneficiary form to make clear who your pension should go to when you die. This is important because defined contribution pensions are not part of your estate, so aren't covered by your will.

• Find out more: How to find old pensions

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4. Check your state pension entitlement

You won’t get the state pension until you reach the age of 66 (rising to 67 between 2026 and 2028), but it should be a key part of your retirement planning. 

From April 2025 the full level of new state pension will be worth £230.30 a week.

The exact amount you get will depend on your National Insurance (NI) record and whether you were ‘contracted out’ of the additional state pension before 2016.

You need 35 years' worth of National Insurance contributions (NICs) to get the full state pension and 10 years to get anything at all.

If you have any gaps in your NI record (years where you didn’t pay National Insurance or qualify for NI credits), you can buy voluntary National Insurance credits. 

This is usually allowed for the last six tax years, but if you reached (or will reach) state pension age after 6 April 2016, you currently have the option to plug gaps going back to 2006. The deadline is 5 April 2025. 

Filling gaps from 2006 to April 2023 will cost you £15.85 a week – or £824 a year. It is important to check with the DWP Future Pension Centre first to make sure you really will benefit from the extra credits.

Check your state pension forecast to see if you are on track to receive a full state pension.

• Find out more: How to make voluntary National Insurance contributions

5. Beware pension scams

According to LV= figures from August 2024, around one in seven – or 7.3m – UK adults have been the subject of an attempted pension scam in the past 12 months.

Meanwhile Action Fraud data show that there were 559 reports of pension fraud in 2023, with £17.8 million stolen in total and an average loss of £46,959 per person.

Make sure you look out for the following warning signs to protect your nest egg from fraudsters:

• Unprompted offers of a free pension review: be wary if you're contacted out of the blue. Reputable advisers won't do this, and it's often the first step in trying to persuade you to make a poor investment.
• Time-limited offers: don't be pressured into making a hasty decision and research a firm before dealing with them. Check the FCA register of regulated companies, and the FCA warning list of known scam firms.
• Offers to release cash from your pension before you reach 55: not only could you lose some or all of your pot to scammers, but early access incurs a hefty tax penalty from HMRC.
• Investments promising guaranteed high returns: don't let the temptation to boost your pension steer you towards unusual investments which are unregulated and high risk.

6. Consider inheritance tax changes

From April 2027, any money left in your pensions will be included with the rest of your estate, potentially incurring inheritance tax (IHT) if the total value of your estate exceeds your tax-free allowance. 

According to research by Standard Life, nearly a third (31%) of savers are considering gifting money to family members more regularly to reduce future IHT liabilities on their pension savings. 

Meanwhile, 21% are thinking about taking out an annuity in retirement to better navigate potential IHT complications by converting it into an income rather than leaving their pension untouched. 

• Find out more: What happens to my pensions when I die?

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