Pension liberation – The case study of Mrs R

Mrs R’s late husband had transferred from his former employer’s pension scheme in February 2014. Mr R died in April 2018.

The trustee company responsible for the scheme he transferred to was wound up in March 2017 and Mrs R was told by the scheme’s administrators there was no money to pay for any benefits now due. It appeared Mr R may have been the victim of pension liberation fraud.

We contacted the pension scheme Mr R had transferred from and asked what checks they had made about the receiving scheme and whether Mr R had been provided with appropriate warnings about the possibility of fraud. The scheme agreed to undertake a full investigation into the transfer.

The scheme subsequently agreed they had failed to carry out sufficient due diligence checks before the transfer was completed. They agreed to reinstate Mr R into their scheme and calculate and pay the death benefits due from his reinstated record.

We thanked the scheme for their assistance.