Complaints

If you’re not happy with how The Pensions Regulator (TPR) has acted, you can use our formal complaints process. We will always take any issues that you raise seriously.

What is covered by our complaints process

We can only deal with complaints against us. This includes complaints about our own:

mistakes or lack of care
unreasonable delay
unprofessional behaviour
bias or lack of integrity

What isn’t covered by our complaints process

If you have an issue with your pension scheme or employer you should always try to sort it out with them first.

Pension scheme complaints

You should contact the scheme trustees or scheme provider as they run the scheme. They will often be able to help sort out your problem. If you don’t know who runs your scheme, your employer should be able to tell you. You can also find pension contact details on GOV.UK.

If this doesn’t solve the problem, the pension scheme will have a dispute procedure you can use. This will tell you who will deal with your complaint and within what timescales. You can also get help from the Pensions Ombudsman.

If you believe your scheme isn’t being run properly you can report the scheme to us. However, our investigation may not sort out your own complaint against the scheme.

Employer complaints

If your complaint is about your employer not meeting their pension duties, you can report the concern to us.

Other issues

Other issues not covered by our complaints process include:

questions about the State Pension
scheme members’ claims for compensation
complaints about pensions legislation

How to complain about us

You should contact the member of staff or team that you first dealt with to discuss your concerns. They may be able to resolve your concerns there and then.

We will tell you if we need to look into the issues you raise in more detail.

If you’re not satisfied with how we handle your concerns you can make a formal complaint. You should send us your complaint in writing unless you’re unable to do so. Please list your main areas of concern and include all relevant information.

We strongly encourage you to send your complaint by email as this is the quickest and easiest way for us to address your concerns.

Email

complaints@thepensionsregulator.gov.uk

Post

Complaints Team
The Pensions Regulator
Telecom House
125-135 Preston Road
Brighton
BN1 6AF

Help with writing to us

If you need help with writing to us we will make every effort to enable you to fully set out your complaint.

Before you contact us

You should be aware of a couple of issues before you contact us.

We aim to be as open and transparent as possible. However, legal constraints such as the Data Protection Act mean we cannot disclose information in certain situations. For example, we may need to avoid releasing:

personal data
information given in confidence
information gathered during regulatory investigations

As a result we may not be able to give specific details about what action we have taken or information we have gathered.

We have limited resources so we take a risk-based approach to regulating. We take action to educate, enable and enforce so that we are able to meet our statutory objectives. Find more information about our approach to regulating.

How we will deal with your complaint

We use a two-stage formal complaints process.

Stage 1

We will aim to acknowledge your complaint within seven working days of receiving it. We will then review all the information we have about your complaint.

We will look at whether:

staff have taken the right actions
staff have been polite and fair
there has been any unreasonable delay or withholding of information

We will write to tell you of our findings within 30 working days. If it takes longer than this we will inform you of progress, the reasons for any delay and when we will reply in full.

In our response we will:

explain anything that went wrong
set out any steps that have been or will be taken to put matters right
state whether your complaint is upheld or not

If your complaint is not upheld we will explain why in our response.

Stage 2

If you're not satisfied with our response you may be able to use stage 2 of the process. Our stage 1 response will tell you if this is the case.

At stage 2 you can ask us to review the way we handled your complaint. When seeking a review you will need to set out in writing those matters that you’re still not satisfied with.

We will acknowledge your stage 2 complaint within five working days. We will aim to reply to you within 30 working days.

Time limits

The following time limits apply to making a formal complaint.

Stage 1 complaint: any time. But if the complaint is about a particular incident you should make it as soon as you can after the event.
Stage 2 complaint: within 28 working days of the date of the stage 1 reply from us.

We understand that each case is different so we may extend these time limits.

Parliamentary Health and Services Ombudsman

The Parliamentary Health and Services Ombudsman can also investigate complaints against us. The Ombudsman usually only accepts a case after our complaints procedure has finished.

You should write to your MP. They will refer your complaint to the Ombudsman.

Victims of crime

If we have taken on a criminal investigation and you don’t believe your rights under the Victims’ Code are being met by us, you can make a complaint. See our page on victims of crime for more information.

Data protection

Our privacy notice gives more details about how we look after personal data.

Complain about TPR