For HR teams and employers, supporting employees with their financial wellbeing is about more than the benefits package on offer. It is also about helping people understand and engage with the benefits available to them.
Workplace pensions form an important part of that picture. Yet with people changing jobs, moving house and building up pension savings with different providers throughout their working lives, it can be surprisingly easy to lose track of an old pension.
That is where National Pension Tracing Day can provide a useful opportunity for employers. It gives HR and benefits teams a timely reason to put pensions back on the agenda and encourage employees to take a closer look at their retirement savings.
A campaign with a purpose
National Pension Tracing Day was created by Punter Southall Aspire in 2021 as a not-for-profit campaign. Secondsight has continued to support and growth the campaign since acquiring Punter Southall Aspire in 2024.
Gavin Zaprzala-Banks, our Head of Client Consulting, was part of the team that created the campaign, giving him a unique perspective on how it has developed over the years.
Why employees can lose track of pensions
As Gavin puts it, pension pots can “kind of drift and become orphaned.”
Changing jobs is a normal part of working life, and each move can mean leaving another pension pot behind. Employees may no longer have the paperwork, may have forgotten the provider or may not know how to access an old account.
Gavin wanted to understand more about the scale of the issue, so he began speaking to pension providers and insurers.
“I did some digging, started reaching out to the insurer market, the companies who look after most of these millions and billions of pounds, and started to really get under the skin of it all and explore what this problem meant.”
The latest figures highlighted by National Pension Tracing Day show the scale of the issue, with around 3 million pension pots thought to be lost or forgotten, representing more than £18.7 billion in retirement savings.
For HR professionals, this highlights why pension engagement can be an important part of a wider financial wellbeing strategy. Employees may have pensions from previous employers alongside their current workplace pension, without necessarily having a clear picture of what they have accumulated over time.
nancial wellbeing programme or simply as a timely reminder for employees to check whether they have old pension pots they may have lost track of.
Employers could use the campaign to:
- remind employees to check whether they have old pension pots
- share guidance on how to trace a lost or forgotten pension
- encourage employees to keep their contact details up to date with pension providers
- signpost existing workplace pension resources and support
- include pension tracing within wider financial wellbeing communications
This year’s #Licence to Trace campaign provides an engaging way to start that conversation, encouraging people to become their own pension tracing agent and take a closer look at where their pension savings are.
It does not need to be a major new initiative. A reminder in an employee newsletter, an intranet post, a team message or a short financial wellbeing session could potentially give someone the prompt they need to start looking.
At Secondsight, we help employers support their people with pensions, benefits and wider financial wellbeing. National Pension Tracing Day fits naturally into that work by giving our members a practical way to engage their people with an important part of their benefits.
Through the campaign, Gavin has heard stories of people finding £5,000 or £10,000 in old pension pots, as well as some who have found six-figure sums.
“We’ve had people who’ve found five grand here, ten grand there. We’ve had some people who found six figure somethings sat in old pension pots.”
Finding an old pension does not guarantee financial freedom in retirement, but reconnecting with forgotten savings could help an individual build a clearer picture of their overall pension position and potentially understand how it fits into their wider financial plans.
That is ultimately why we continue to lead the National Pension Tracing Day campaign. As Gavin puts it:
“The whole purpose of this is not about Secondsight, it’s not about the insurance companies, it’s about that one end member who we can connect with that one bit of pension saving that they’ve made but forgotten about to supercharge their future.”
For employers and HR professionals, National Pension Tracing Day could be a simple way to put pensions back on the agenda and give employees useful guidance on finding savings they may have lost track of.
How can your organisation get involved?
The National Pension Tracing Day campaign runs throughout the entirety of October, coming to a close on the day itself, Sunday 25th October 2026.
If you are an employer or HR professional, you could use the campaign as an opportunity to share pension tracing guidance with your employees and encourage them to check whether they have any old pensions they may have lost track of.
Find out more about National Pension Tracing Day and access useful campaign resources here: www.nationalpensiontracingday.co.uk/resources
