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United Kingdom → Ireland

Find your pension after working in United Kingdom and Ireland

Pensions accrued in United Kingdom and Ireland are administered separately by each country's providers and registers. We do the identification work in both jurisdictions, the route is different in each, and we use the verified route per country.

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Full refund if we find nothing material.

What this page rests on

  • United Kingdom: Full-market dossier, the published country page records the route and the date each fact was checked.
  • Ireland: Official route read against the source by a person on 2026-07-04, recorded in docs/exports/country-routes-content-extract.md.

Each fact below carries its own source and the date it was checked. Our method and the written replies from national authorities are published in full. A named researcher reads every report before it is sent.

Your United Kingdom pension entitlement

Verified country facts

Every line below is drawn from the verified country dossier. We never fabricate facts; candidate items are gated out of customer-facing copy.

Why it matters

The April-2026 voluntary-NI regime change: cheap Class 2 from abroad is abolished and a one-time transitional door (old rules, incl. Class-2 payers switching without the 10-year residence test) has its own closing date, confirmed by the Future Pension Centre.

If you do nothing

The cheap voluntary-NI window lapses at the transitional door; outside it, only the standard 6-year backdating remains and older years fall away year by year. Workplace pots are preserved (not auto-paid).

Time-critical dates

  • Voluntary-NI transitional door: The rules changed in April 2026. A one-time transitional door under the old rules, including existing Class-2 payers switching to Class-3 without the 10-year test, has its own closing date, which the Future Pension Centre confirms on request. Gaps in the record itself can normally be filled for the past six tax years, each with its own deadline, on 5 April.
  • Short-service refund: If you were in a defined-contribution scheme, a refund of your own contributions was only possible if you left within 30 days of joining (for schemes joined after October 2015). If you were in a defined-benefit scheme, a refund was only possible if you were a member for under two years.

How records are reached

Personal-record access wall: Government Gateway (the personal State Pension forecast / NI record)

Companies House and the government's free Pension Tracing Service are both public, PTS returns scheme contact details only, never balances or membership confirmation, and a well-known commercial namesake (pensiontracingservice.com) is not the government service. The genuine difficulty in UK pension lineage is that employers get acquired, schemes get bulk-bought, providers rebrand, and a 1990s payroll deduction can land in a scheme with a name nobody at the original employer would recognise today.

From abroad: Public records and PTS work from anywhere without your credentials; the personal state-pension forecast needs Government Gateway, and HMRC's identity checks can be hard to pass from overseas. The harder problem from abroad isn't the gateway, it's that scheme-name continuity in the UK breaks repeatedly across decades, and reading that history is what the work actually is.

Cross-border

Many bilateral/reciprocal agreements; post-Brexit EU-UK protocol preserves aggregation. Where you retire decides whether your UK State Pension rises each year or freezes at its first payment for life. Australia, Canada and New Zealand freeze it; the USA does not.

Primary sources: gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details · gov.uk (voluntary NI / state pension) · developer.company-information.service.gov.uk

Your Ireland pension, who to write to

Verified country facts

Every line below is drawn from the verified country dossier. We never fabricate facts; candidate items are gated out of customer-facing copy.

Why it matters

There is no official Irish pension-tracing service, and EU contributions can combine with Irish PRSI for a pro-rata State Pension (minimum 52 Irish reckonable contributions).

If you do nothing

A preserved DB benefit revalues at the lesser of CPI/4%; there is no statutory forfeiture of an unclaimed preserved occupational pension, but every month of unclaimed State Pension past entitlement age is forfeited (limited backdating).

Time-critical dates

  • SPC backdating: 6 months maximum backdating on the State Pension (Contributory)Official source, checked 16 September 2026
  • Voluntary PRSI window: 60-month (5-year) application window from the end of the last compulsory-contribution year (high rate 6.6%, min €500/yr)Official source, checked 16 September 2026

How records are reached

Personal-record access wall: MyGovID (the personal PRSI record / MyWelfare)

There is no official Irish pension-tracing service, the EIOPA IORP register lists trustees and schemes of 12+ members but does not map employer to scheme, and Ireland is the only-tracing-route market in our fleet for the pre-2026 era. The depth here is on the state side: EU contributions can combine with as little as 52 Irish reckonable PRSI contributions for a pro-rata State Pension.

From abroad: No part of Irish pension tracing gets easier or harder by being abroad, the absence of a tracing service applies equally everywhere, and the work is the same.

Cross-border

EU pro-rata (52-Irish-week floor); Ireland↔UK CTA convention preserves reciprocal rights; bilateral agreements (AU, CA, US).

Primary sources: register.eiopa.europa.eu · gov.ie / citizensinformation.ie · pensionsauthority.ie

Cross-border, factual

United Kingdom and Ireland pensions are not pooled or auto-consolidated. Each leg is worked on its own: registers searched in United Kingdom, registers searched in Ireland, and contact details surfaced where the dossier supports it. State pensions may be affected by bilateral or reciprocal agreements between the two jurisdictions, each country page records what its dossier establishes; we do not invent treaty effects.

Frequently asked questions

Can PensionHunter trace a pension from United Kingdom when I now live in Ireland?

Yes. Our report covers identification work in both United Kingdom and Ireland as separate jurisdictions. Each country's pensions are administered locally; we work each one using the access route published on its country page.

Do my United Kingdom and Ireland pensions combine automatically?

No. Pensions accrued in United Kingdom stay with United Kingdom schemes; pensions accrued in Ireland stay with Ireland schemes. They are administered separately. Bilateral and reciprocal agreements may affect state pension aggregation in some pairs, see each country page for what its dossier records.

What does the Pension Identification Report deliver for a United Kingdom→Ireland working history?

An identification-only report covering both jurisdictions: registers searched, any provider matches with contact details, and any registers that require you to check directly using your own credentials. We do not give financial advice, transfer pensions, or estimate values.

What if you find nothing?

Full refund if we find nothing material. Fixed fee, $99 Country Pension Identification Report, $499 Enhanced Pension Identification Report, $799 Global (covers all requested countries).

See also