15 September 2025
Sacker & Partners LLP (Sackers), the UK’s leading specialist law firm for pensions and retirement savings, today responded to the government’s technical consultation on legislation to include unused pension funds as part of an individual’s estate for IHT purposes, which closed today.
Claire van Rees, partner comments: “The draft legislation addresses many practical concerns raised by the pensions industry around workability of the initial proposals, albeit by pushing much of the burden on to personal representatives. However, some issues remain, particularly around clarifying exactly when death in service lump sums will be excluded from scope of IHT, and on some practical implementation areas. The overall policy also extends differences in treatment between unmarried couples and those married or in a civil partnership, particularly as DC pensions grow in importance. Once the legislation is finalised, trustees and pension scheme administrators will need to take stock on how to implement new processes, and what they should be communicating to members.”
Claire has also written a blog here: IHT and Pension Death Benefits: The Road to 2027 |
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