Eligibility

How to know if you can transfer

Next, we’ll help you find out if you can transfer online. We accept most, but not all pensions. Here we check that we can accept the pensions you’d like to move to Scottish Widows.

Pensions you can’t transfer online

For some types of pension, you’d have to speak to an independent financial adviser if you want to transfer. These include when:

• Your pension is with a provider outside the UK.
• It’s a final salary pension (also known as a defined benefit pension).
• It’s affected by a pension sharing order or pension earmarking order. This is where a pension has been divided up as part of a divorce.
• It was set up using a pension credit you got under a pension sharing order.
• It’s affected by a bankruptcy order.

If an employer, or someone other than you, is paying into your pension, you won’t be able to transfer online to Scottish Widows.

You can find out about these in your policy documents, or by speaking to your provider or scheme administrator.

Why we can’t accept pensions with guarantees

Some pensions come with extra guarantees. These can be valuable, and you’d lose them when you transfer. That's why we don’t accept pensions with guarantees such as:

• A Guaranteed Annuity Rate: this means, in most cases, you’d get a higher income for life when you retire than you’d get at today’s annuity rates.
• Guaranteed Conversion Option: this allows you to convert your pension into a fund. This fund then gives you access to a wider, more flexible range of benefit options. At today’s rates, this fund is unlikely to be worth as much as your original pension.
• Section 9(2B) rights: these would provide you with an income that’s based on what you earned at the time this pension was set up.
• Guaranteed Minimum Pension: some older pensions set up by an employer might offer this benefit. You’d receive this if your employer’s scheme was contracted out of part of the state pension. To find out more, you can contact your scheme administrator.

These features can’t be transferred online. You can talk to an independent financial adviser if you’d like to transfer one of these.

If your pension scheme is run by trustees

If you have a pension which was set up by your employer, it might be managed by trustees. If so, you will need to get permission from these trustees before you transfer to us.

If you’re not sure if your pension is run by trustees, check your policy or scheme documents, or contact your scheme administrator.

If you’d like to know more, you can read more about any of these points in our guide section.

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