From: "Rob graham" 
Newsgroups: uk.finance
Subject: Re: Any pension guru's on here?
Date: Thu, 7 Jun 2007 07:30:01 +0100


"diy-newby"  wrote in message 
news:n_KdnZuFNKZmWfvbnZ2dneKdnZydnZ2d@pipex.net...
>I have 3 pensions, 2 of which are dormant from previous employers.  1 of 
>the
> dormant pensions had contributions paid into it for about 3 years, the 
> other
> one for about 6 months (so nothing much in there at all).
>
> My 3rd pension is the one which I contribute into with my current 
> employer.
> Is it possible to transfer whatever funds are in the 2 dormant pensions 
> into
> the active one?

Yes. If they are final salary schemes the transfer value will vary from time 
to time because of the way it's calculated. So at some time it may be better 
than at others to make a switch. You'd need advice about this, ideally. 
There are a lot of issues to consider. Tho' if the funds are small you may 
not think advice is worth it.

If they are money purchase, then the transfer value will alter with the fund 
perfromance and there may also be a penalty to take the funds away from the 
provider early.

Or, can these be 'cashed  in'?

The final salary ones might be encashable if you were not in the schemes for 
more than 2 years. By encashable, I mean return of your contributions, which 
may well be less than what the scheme is worth to you as it stands.

You may find that the value of the scheme decreases with the effect of 
charges, but this would depend on the type of scheme. It might be worth 
switching it anyway to avoid this.

If you are aged 50, then you can take the benefits in some form or another, 
or even use the triviality concession.

Unfortunately, you have not given enogh detail to be able to make a proper 
judgment. There is no 'one size fits all' guidance.

Rob Graham