Will you be okay for money when you’re older?

More than a million people save toward their future with Smart Pension. We know, from speaking to many when they first join Smart Pension, that two things are common:

1. People find pensions confusing
2. Most people would like to feel more comfortable about their financial future

We also know that it doesn’t have to be that complicated. The pensions world is full of jargon, and the media is not always so great at simplifying it.

In this article, we’ll guide you through a few simple steps that could help you to feel more financially secure in the future.

1. Check what you’ve got

To kickstart your plan, the first step is to assess your current pension situation.

The three types of pensions are the ‘State Pension’, your ‘workplace’ pension and any ‘personal’ pensions you may have. Many people do not save into a personal pension, and those who do will usually know about it. That means, for most of us, the State Pension and workplace pensions will together provide the money we’ll receive during retirement. It’s easy to check both of these:

• To check your State Pension entitlement, the government offers a simple tool. Check your State Pension forecast.
• To check your workplace pension, you need to find out which provider your employer chose for you. Usually, once you’ve done that, you can log into their system and find out. If you use Smart Pension, you can sign in to your account at any time, online, and see up-to-the-minute information on your pension.

By doing this, you’ll see how much you’ve already saved and get a clear picture of your current situation. If you use Smart Pension, once you’ve logged in the pension calculator tool, will show you a projection of what you are likely to receive when you retire.

Using both of these together helps you understand what you’ll receive from the state, and what you’ll receive from your workplace pension, and these are the two sources of money that most people in the UK will rely on during their retirement.

For some, there is an extra source – a personal pension. Most who have these will already know about them. And for many, which leads us on to step two.

2. Trace your old pensions

For many of us, pension savings may be spread across various pension providers from previous jobs. It’s easy to lose track of these savings, but it’s never too late to track them down. They can also be ‘consolidated’ – gathered together – and brought to your current workplace pension provider, making it easier to manage your retirement savings.

Bringing your old pensions together can make planning easier, cut down on the time you need to manage your pensions across different accounts and save you money. This is because all providers charge a fee for keeping your money with them, so bringing all your pensions into one account means you are only paying one fee instead of several.

If you use Smart Pension, we have simple tools both to trace your old pension savings, and if you wish to, you can combine them and manage them all through us. You can start now by using our handy tool to find your old pension savings.

3. Make simple decisions about what you want to do for the future

Now that you’ve taken stock of your current pension situation, you’re in a great position to make a plan.

If you’re saving with Smart Pension, there are several actions you can take , including:

• Using our pension calculator tool to give you a good idea about how much money you’re likely to receive when you have retired.
• Increasing the amount you save from your salary each month. This can offer additional tax-free savings and may even boost how much your employer saves on your behalf. Smart Pension members can choose how much they contribute from their salary here.
• Changing how your money is invested. With Smart Pension we can do all of this for you, or you can choose to invest in different funds we offer. Smart Pension members can choose their investments here.

Each of these steps is just a start. However, if you have checked your current pension savings, traced and brought together your old savings from previous jobs and taken stock of where they are then you’ve already taken the largest steps on your path to the financial future you want.

• Sign in today if you’re a Smart Pension member.
• Find out more from our other financial wellbeing articles.