Proposals to introduce a pensions passport to help individuals keep track of their pension pots should become “a reality”, Barnett Waddingham senior consultant Malcolm McLean has said.

Minister for Pensions Steve Webb is currently consulting on ways to gather information on people’s pension pots, and the idea of a pensions passport has been put forward to ease future pension planning for individuals.

“The idea of a pensions passport, a document that would hold information on all of a person’s pension policies, has much to commend it and should be developed,” McLean said.

“Obviously setting this up and collecting all the data together in the first place would be challenging but would pay dividends in the longer term. This, together with the automatic transfer of small pension pots would not only help people keep track of their policies but would help them search for lost policies.

"It would also prompt them to think of their future pension planning and options for retirement – particularly relevant in the wake of the new pensions freedoms and greater choices soon to be made available.”

McLean argued “clearly the time has come for the idea of pension passports to become a reality”.

"The days when pension papers and other related documents were kept on a shelf or at the back of a desk drawer should be put behind us and better and more sophisticated methods of information storage brought into use for the benefit of all concerned."

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