Bringing forward unused pension contributions

[Fred Bloggs]

Many thanks. My accountant commented that I could indeed carry forward the allowance, but could not advise on the process. Sounds like there isn't one, so that's nice and easy. I have much the same, so will do it this way. I understand you need to use the whole of 'this year's' allowance before you can use the carry forward.

Correct, you do. The chunk(s) above the GBP 40k then count against year 3 then 2 then 1 then current year. So it is a rolling three year carry forward scenario. For once, it is actually quite a straight forward thing to do, a rarity in itself these days.

[Scrag Meister]

I paid in over the allowance a couple of years back.

I got a letter from the pension provider pointing this out to me, so I rung them but they said it was fine, they were just making me aware.

I'm planning on backfilling 15/16 as I was off for 8 months last year.

[fidot]

According to the pensions advisory service

"To use carry forward, you must make the maximum allowable contribution in the current tax year (£40,000 in 2016-17) and can then use unused annual allowances from the three previous tax years, starting with the tax year three years ago."

I'll double check with my SIPP provider.

Interesting. Thanks i'll check with my IFA too.

[IR35 Avoider]

I agree that after using current year allowance, the oldest unfilled year is always next in line.

[eastway]

I've had a bit of a google & not found anything concrete.. are you able to carry forward unused pension contributions and pay that into a different pension scheme?

Basically I have a company pension from when I was in permie land, this is just collecting dust as I've not made any contributions since leaving that job & has been in existence since about 2010. From my understanding if you've had a valid pension scheme in place you can make use of the "carry forward", but would I have to contribute to the already existing scheme, or could I set myself up a SIPP and make use of it that way?

Thanks

[Lambert Simnel]

I've had a bit of a google & not found anything concrete.. are you able to carry forward unused pension contributions and pay that into a different pension scheme?

Basically I have a company pension from when I was in permie land, this is just collecting dust as I've not made any contributions since leaving that job & has been in existence since about 2010. From my understanding if you've had a valid pension scheme in place you can make use of the "carry forward", but would I have to contribute to the already existing scheme, or could I set myself up a SIPP and make use of it that way?

Thanks

You can use it in another scheme. (I've done this personally, as well as having talked about it with pension advisors)

[eastway]

You can use it in another scheme. (I've done this personally, as well as having talked about it with pension advisors)

Great - good to hear this from someone that's already done it

[DallasDad]

I had a Pension with HP for years which ended when I took VR in July 2015
Hard bit for me is finding out the previous years contributions.
I assume that will be the sum of mine plus theirs
I received a letter only a few days ago stating my 2015/16 Pension Input Amount (PIA) was circa £80 or so, that simply can't be right so I am somewhat befuddled!

Maybe asking how much I and HP paid into my pension was the wrong question!

[Lambert Simnel]

I had a Pension with HP for years which ended when I took VR in July 2015
Hard bit for me is finding out the previous years contributions.
I assume that will be the sum of mine plus theirs
I received a letter only a few days ago stating my 2015/16 Pension Input Amount (PIA) was circa £80 or so, that simply can't be right so I am somewhat befuddled!

Maybe asking how much I and HP paid into my pension was the wrong question!

Might be confusion due to the transitional rules which took affect in 2015/6, basically starting a new pension input period from 9th July 2015. Any pension contributions made up to that point were made part of a special period (still with limit of £40k but which I think you can't backdate contributions into). Aligning the pension input period to the tax year (required as part of the introduction of tapering relief when your package goes above £150k) meant that the principle pension input period for that year ran from 9th July 2015 to 5 April 2016.

So my guess is that your contributions more or less all fitted into that "special" input period up to 8th July 2015, and only a very limited amount was allocated to the full/second input period which you can use for backdating contributions into.