Only consolidating pots worth <£1k would still mean many people would reach retirement with savings scattered across several pots.

No timeline was announced for the consolidation of larger deferred pots. But the Minister for Pensions did indicate this could happen in the future

The DWP report contains lots of detail on how this will be implemented in practice. They plan to create a Small Pots Data Platform to carry out the consolidation.

Good to see that they will consider how this platform could build on the work done for Pensions Dashboard.

Earlier this year, we showed that lower earners, younger employees and women are particularly likely to accumulate these small pots.

In 2024 there were over 13 million pension pots in the UK worth <£1k that are no longer being contributed to ("deferred"). This is up from around 12 million in 2023.

Plus another 10 million pots worth between £1k and £10k.

We also find no evidence of employers being more likely to dismiss workers once they reach the ERA in the UK. While this is common in e.g. the Netherlands & the US, strong age discrimination laws prevent this in the UK.

This led to an increase in employment rates for women in their early 60s of just over 9 percentage points.

The magnitude of the increase is consistent with studies from other countries.

We compare the employment responses for different groups of women to shed light on the key drivers.

To do this, we look at the increase in the ERA for women in the UK (often referred to as the state pension age).

The female ERA increased from 60 to 66 between 2010 and 2020.