I always tell people that my career at HM Treasury was extremely brief, although in fairness I was actually in my role there for longer than three of the past five chancellors.
I ended a 10-month stint working in policy in January 2022 and returned to journalism – but my financial relationship with my ex-employer did not end there.
We regularly hear about how civil service pensions are gold-plated. Unlike most pension schemes in the private sector – which see staff save money that they will then drawdown from when they stop working – defined benefit (DB) schemes enjoyed by many public sector employees, such as those working in government, see workers build up an annual entitlement for their retirement.
The civil service scheme is generous, there’s no doubt about that. In retirement, you get 1/60th of your pensionable earnings for every year of service in the scheme.
This passed me by when I joined the Treasury at the start of 2021 – though in my defence along with the rest of the country I had bigger concerns at the time, such as whether I’d ever be allowed to leave my house again.
It was only several months after I left the job, to return to journalism, that I wondered for the first time: “Hang on, what happens to my pension?”
I eventually got in touch with Civil Service Pensions, who let me know that sadly, I couldn’t stay in the generous DB scheme on behalf of my short stint in the job, though I could instead transfer the value of my pension to a new scheme.
Ever the financial journalist, my first thought was: “How many people who don’t follow up on this and miss out?” The answer it turns out is quite a lot.
An investigation by i last year, which was definitely in no way inspired by my own experience, found that thousands of public sector staff miss out on switching their pensions after leaving their jobs, possibly losing thousands of pounds in retirement.
It turns out the civil service had written to me soon after I left the role to let me know of my options but, as like many young renters I move home every year or so, I’d already switched to a new address by this time.
I asked to transfer the pension value – which was around £4,000 – to my new provider and was told I’d need to fill out the form – likely languishing in a bin near my old house – to do so.
What followed was an agonising several months of email and letter communication where the form was sent out again, to my old address, then to a house on my new road – but crucially not mine – and eventually to my actual flat.
I got used to the five working day response times from the Civil Service Pensions team and even thoroughly read up on how I would submit a complaint about my experience to the pensions ombudsman!
In the end, by the time I was able to finally get hold of the form, my new pension provider told me that the Civil Service Pensions were going through a “blackout” period. This meant due to a backlog of requests, they weren’t doing any more pension transfers for the time being.
More chasing, and several months later, in September 2023, success was finally achieved. The £4,000 appeared in my Scottish Widows account, where my current pension is held.
I sometimes wonder what the hourly rate was for the task, when I consider how long it took me, although when I finally retire in about 40 years time, I’m sure that extra £4,000 will make all the difference to me enjoying my later years in financial prosperity.
Let’s just hope the triple lock plus is alive and thriving in the mid-2060s.