Nearly half of pension transfer scam alerts for unknown reasons

Some 35% of flagged cases related to ‘overseas investments’

Sophia Panayi
clock • 2 min read

Only a minority of pension transfers flagged as potential scams are “genuinely high risk” whilst nearly half of the cases were recorded as ‘unknown’ or ‘blank’, according to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request from PensionBee.

The FOI data obtained from the Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) by PensionBee, an online retirement savings provider, revealed the reasons behind the 51,417 amber flags since November 2021. It revealed 23,542 cases, 46%, were recorded as ‘unknown' or ‘blank' - categories that do not exist in legislation, PensionBee said. Additionally, 18,135, which equates to 35% of cases, related to ‘overseas investments'. PensionBee noted this is a category regulators have already acknowledged is being misapplied. Within months of the schemes implementation, the Department for Work and Pensions ...

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