Raindrop reunites GBP £447 million in lost pensions

Raindrop reunited customers with £447 million in lost pension savings during the first quarter, up 309% from the same period a year earlier.

The pension-finding platform traced 61,858 lost pension pots in the quarter, compared with 10,361 a year earlier, a rise of 497%.

Since launch, it has located £1.6 billion in pension savings across more than 166,000 lost or forgotten pots. Raindrop works with providers including Aegon, AJ Bell and Monzo to help customers trace pension savings.

The figures come against a wider backdrop of lost retirement savings in the UK. Research from the Pensions Policy Institute estimated that £31.1 billion is sitting in 3.3 million lost pension pots.

That has drawn attention to services that help savers reconnect with pensions from previous jobs. Frequent job changes, house moves and poor record-keeping can leave workers disconnected from older retirement accounts, creating administrative barriers when they try to consolidate their savings later in life.

Raindrop said the average age of savers using its pension-tracing tool is 38. This suggests interest is not limited to people nearing retirement, but also includes working-age adults taking stock of long-term savings earlier.

Gender gap

Raindrop also reported a gap between male and female users in the pension pots traced through its platform. During the first quarter, 67% of pots tracked down were found by men and 33% by women, based on cases where users provided gender information.

That split adds to broader concerns about gender differences in retirement outcomes, long linked to pay disparities, career breaks and part-time work. While the figures relate only to users of Raindrop's service, they point to uneven patterns of engagement with pension tracing.

Efforts to tackle lost pensions have gathered pace as policymakers and providers try to improve visibility over retirement savings. The issue has become more pressing with the growth of automatic enrolment, which has increased the number of people building pension entitlements across multiple employers and schemes.

Each job move can leave a saver with another small pension pot, and over time those accounts can be forgotten. Tracing them can be cumbersome if paperwork is missing or provider details have changed.

"There is huge consumer demand for simple pension-finding tools as people look to take control of their retirement savings. Lost pots remain a major issue in the UK, and locating lost pensions by yourself can often be a difficult and complex process requiring a great deal of time and effort. Tools such as Raindrop's pension-finding platform enable savers to track down their lost pots with minimal hassle and ensure they are maximising their retirement savings," Vivan Shridharani, Co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer at Raindrop, said.

"Raindrop's technology will soon have found over £2 billion in lost pots for UK savers as we continue to work alongside some of the UK's largest pension providers to offer simple pension-tracing tools."

A growing part of the market now involves providers working with specialist technology firms to improve pension administration and customer access. For large financial groups, tracing lost pots can help reconnect clients with dormant savings. It may also create opportunities for customers to review how their retirement funds are allocated across several schemes.

"In order to meet this demand, pension providers and financial institutions are increasingly looking to support their customers by working with specialist fintechs like Raindrop, which can unlock access to technology that finds misplaced pension pots quickly and efficiently for savers. Not only can providers enhance their support for customers, this approach also supports consolidation, giving savers the option to bring their pots together, making them easier to manage and often reducing fees," Shridharani said in a separate comment.

Founded in 2020, the company focuses on pension-finding technology for savers and financial firms. Its latest quarterly figures underline the scale of the UK's lost-pensions problem, with £31.1 billion still estimated to be sitting in millions of unclaimed pots.