Marvin OnumonuAn estimated 3.3 million lost pension pots, worth £31.1bn, were found in research conducted by the Pensions Policy Institute (PPI).
This is an increase from 2.8 million pots valued at around £26bn two years ago.
The average size of a lost pot peaked at £13,620 among those aged 55 to 75, while the average for the over-75 age group dropped from £12,190 in 2022 to £6,540 in 2024.
Helen Morrissey, head of retirement analysis at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: “The lost pension problem is booming, with an estimated 3.3m pots going astray.
“This blows a £31bn hole in the nation’s retirement planning that needs to be addressed.
“It’s easy to lose track of a pension – we move jobs and homes and contact details get lost along the way. It’s a consequence of auto-enrolment that you get a pension with every job, but the risk is they go astray.
“It’s not a small problem either – that pension from the job you had ten years ago will have grown and you risk losing out on thousands of pounds that could be used for your retirement income.
“The government has its Pension Tracing Service in place to help people track down lost pensions.
“A recent FOI tabled by Hargreaves Lansdown showed demand is growing, with 31,505 calls made to the service between 1 January and 24 May this year.
“There have been 276,000 calls made since January 2019 – it’s clearly needed but the reality is it’s barely scratching the surface of the problem.
“The Pensions Dashboard will help when it arrives but it’s going to be a few years before we see it and we need actions that prevent the pensions going astray in the first place.
“The Government’s work on small pots will help by bringing them together in a default consolidator model, though this would not deal with the issue of larger pots going walkabout.
“The Lifetime Pension model could help nip the issue in the bud by allowing people to highlight the provider they want their pension contributions paid to throughout their career.
“Keeping a pot for life will make it far easier to keep track of and boost engagement as members can see their pension grow in one place rather than having a fragmented picture through scattered pensions.”
