Pension Scams Targeting Expats: How to Recognise the Red Flags

1. Unsolicited Contact

You received a call, email, WhatsApp message, or social media approach from someone you did not engage. They offered advice or information about your UK pension, mentioned your existing pension provider by name, or suggested you have unused pension benefits available.

Legitimate UK pension providers and regulated advisers do not make cold calls. The FCA has banned cold calling about pensions. If you receive unsolicited contact about your pension from anyone — regardless of how professional they appear or what they claim — treat it as a significant red flag.

Scammers obtain lists of pension holders and expats through data purchases, social media scraping, and referral networks. They may know your name, approximate pension value, or former employer.

2. The Offer to Access Pension Before Age 55

This is perhaps the single most reliable indicator of fraud. The minimum pension access age in the UK is currently 55, rising to 57 in 2028. Accessing pension funds before this age is only permitted in cases of serious ill health (and is subject to strict criteria).

If anyone claims they can arrange for you to receive some or all of your pension before age 55 — described as a "pension loan", a "pension advance", a "QROPS release", or any other framing — walk away immediately. There is no legitimate mechanism to access UK pension savings before 55 (other than ill health). Proceeding will likely result in both the loss of your pension and a substantial HMRC tax charge.

The charge for an unauthorised payment from a pension is 40% of the payment, plus a further 15% surcharge where the unauthorised payments reach 25% or more of the fund in a year — a combined charge of up to 55% of the amount withdrawn. (A separate scheme sanction charge can be levied on the scheme administrator, but the unauthorised payment charge and surcharge are what fall on the pension member — not the scammer.)

3. Claims of HMRC Approval

HMRC does not approve, endorse, or certify specific pension schemes, transfer arrangements, or advisers as "legitimate" or "compliant" beyond maintaining official registers. The HMRC QROPS list is a register of schemes that have met certain conditions — not an endorsement.

Phrases such as "HMRC approved", "fully HMRC compliant", "HMRC registered and authorised", or "approved by the UK government" in the context of a pension transfer are meaningless marketing at best and fraudulent misrepresentation at worst. Do not be reassured by them.

4. High, Guaranteed, or Fixed Returns

No legitimate investment can guarantee specific high returns. Pensions invested in the real world are subject to market movements, and their value can fall as well as rise. Any pitch that promises a guaranteed return — "10% per year guaranteed", "secure 8% income", "guaranteed growth fund" — is either misrepresenting the product or offering an investment that is not what it appears.

Scam pension investments are often described as providing high fixed returns through investments in unusual sectors: overseas hotel developments, luxury resorts, car park schemes, forestry, private lending, or similarly opaque structures. The "investment" is often fictitious or designed primarily to extract fees, with the pension money being moved offshore and becoming unrecoverable.

5. Exotic or Unusual Investments in the Pension

Alongside the guaranteed returns pitch, scam schemes almost always involve investments that sound unusual but are described as "unique" or "high yield". These include:

• Overseas property developments (often described as "HMRC approved investment property")
• Cryptocurrency funds within a pension wrapper
• Private company shares with no market
• Hotel or resort room ownership schemes
• Loans to property developers
• Forestry, agricultural, and carbon credit schemes

Some of these investments exist legitimately in other contexts. None of them are appropriate pension investments under HMRC's rules for registered pension schemes. Placing pension assets in unrecognised investments triggers the "taxable property" charge — an unauthorised payment charge — regardless of whether the scammer told you it was legal.

6. Pressure to Sign Quickly

"This offer is only available until Friday." "Our allocation is almost full." "If you don't confirm by end of week, you'll miss the window." "Your current pension provider will block this if they find out, so we need to move quickly."

Legitimate financial advisers and pension providers do not pressure clients into fast decisions. Pension transfers are significant long-term decisions. Any adviser who creates urgency — particularly if combined with instructions to keep the transfer confidential from your existing provider — is a scammer.

7. No Clear FCA Registration or Overseas Equivalent

UK financial advisers providing advice on pension transfers must be authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and must hold specific pension transfer qualifications (a "Transfer of Benefits" qualification for defined benefit transfers, or equivalent qualifications for other pension advice).

Any person or firm providing pension advice without clear, current FCA registration — or without registration from a recognised equivalent regulator in an overseas jurisdiction — is providing unregulated advice. Unregulated advice is not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). If the advice is negligent or the investment fails, you have no recourse.

To understand fraud, it helps to understand the legitimate process.

A legitimate SIPP-to-SIPP transfer or SIPP-to-QROPS transfer involves:

• A regulated financial adviser providing documented advice
• A formal application to the receiving scheme, including identity verification
• The transferring provider conducting its own due diligence on the receiving scheme
• Funds transferred directly from the UK provider to the receiving scheme — never to the client or to a third party
• HMRC oversight of the transfer record

You will never receive cash from a legitimate pension transfer. The funds always move directly between trustees. If anyone asks for your bank details so that "your pension can be released to you before being reinvested", this is fraud.

Global Investments is an independent international advisory firm. Regulated services are provided through our authorised partners, and where UK-regulated pension advice is required it is delivered by an FCA-authorised Pension Transfer Specialist we work with. We do not cold call. We do not offer access to pension funds before age 55. We do not promise guaranteed returns.

If you have been approached about your pension and are unsure whether the contact is legitimate, we can provide an independent assessment of what you have been told and what — if any — legitimate options exist for your situation.

Protecting your pension from fraud is as important as growing it. If you have any doubt about any pension communication you have received, seek independent advice before taking any action.

Pension rules and fraud patterns evolve. This guide reflects the position as at 2026. For the latest information on pension scam patterns, the FCA's ScamSmart service at fca.org.uk/scamsmart provides up-to-date guidance.