Teachers' Pensions Anmeldelser 

It’s hard to believe Teachers’ Pension could be any shittier, even if they tried. How were they were awarded the contract in the first place? Even when you write a complaint, they are too lazy/arrogant/incompetent/sadistic to write a letter back. Instead they send you a message via their website which is under maintenance for three weeks.

Appalling service. I would suggest not using the online messaging service the response times are so slow, months not the 15 working days they suggest. I am still waiting for information I requested regarding them contacting my employer. My employer has no record of the TPS ever contacting them, and I made this request using the telephone service. I called TPS again today and I was 'cut-off'. I am not expecting TPS to try and call me back which is a poor state of affairs. It's fair to say they are incompetent. The sooner I can get my pension and hopefully never have to deal with TPS again the better.

This company is absolutely awful. The site is now inaccessible until 2nd November. Yet, I have been sent an email today telling me there is an important message on my profile. Utter incompetence and no respect for members. We have no choice in which company manages our pension and are forced to accept this pitifully bad administration of what is OUR MONEY. We have worked hard in a profession that has been undervalued and poorly remunerated for many years and where the pressure is becoming unbearable. Get to retirement and get messed about beyond words. Shocking treatment and no empathy or compassion shown towards retiring and retired teachers by the people who run this ghastly outfit.

The Teacher's Pensions website is down from today until November 1st under maintenance!!! What perfect timing to coincide with teachers' half term, when this is the only time they can actually have time to go online!!! Once again!!!! Absolute shoddy service!

A postscript to my recent review.
First: I repeat my recommendation of the 2FAS authenticator app. It works first time, every time, so is both free and trouble-free. Its logo is a red shield with 3 horizontal white lines of different length in the top left corner.
Next: There is a complaints form you can download or, presumably, get TP to post to you. Even if this doesn't result in a solution, it could be a useful first step on the route towards an Ombudsman or even to litigation for those who are getting desperate.
Lastly: After the website froze on me yesterday, I finally got through to a helpful TP agent (Gina) who informed me that, in practical terms, the switch from Capita to TCS will make little or no difference to TP members. The same teams will still be working at Darlington and all records and paperwork will still be available. I'm not sure if that's good or bad news but thought it worth sharing, as their own web-site had given me a rather different impression.
Good luck to all those still struggling with this so often frustrating and very imperfect system.

I have tried over several months to get them to understand that their weird system of accessing My Pension on Line is an absolute joke. I live in North Cyprus and it is useless. Alyson Collingwood the head of operations continues to write to say we are trying to put things right, this is over the last 5 months. You write a letter to Alan Taylor the CEO and he totally ignores your correspondence. Like many others i am at a loss to understand these issues. when you telephone it is always you are 27th in the queue.
Is the Financial Ombudsman looking into this hope less organisation?

Been in queue for nearly 2 hours. Tried the other day and started 8th in the queue and they hung up as I was in position 2 after holding for 1 and half hours . Disgusting service. This organisation is useless and has caused me and lots of other teachers a lot of stress.

Straight from the stone age. I need to change my phone number; easy, right?
I phone them... 27 ahead of me. I give all my details, pass security and then... "Write to us and put in all the information that you have just given us, so we know it's you." Absolute rubbish.

Labyrinthine login levels of a system that doesn't work.
34 minutes on a phone loop with no reply.
Hopeless communication with Bots.
A disgracefully frustrating organisation.
Next step, the Ombudsman
I am good on internet functions, but what about retired people who aren't so good - impossible for them!

New MFA login is a joke!
Passwords rejected even after reset, several attempts needed.
Once onto PIN entry page, the 'number' boxes jump around at random.
Eventually reaching QR display, which frequently fails to scan with error message.
Several hours later after finally capturing QR, MFA codes fail, not accepted or 'expired'.
Many fruitless hours wasted.
Even had to ask husband for help. Still no joy.
Truly awful experience. TPS staff used to be helpful and friendly.

I’m applying on behalf of my father for my mother’s pension rights to be transferred to him. I applied on line, which is not straightforward, only then to receive a letter instructing me that a paper submission must be made. Aggravating in this on line world. But then I tried to ring the support line for information to help complete the form. The automated response told me all about when the service wasn’t available because of training, all the reasons why I shouldn’t be abusive to staff, which they managed to make sound like a threat, what services were available on line, which is totally initially ironic…. And on calling I was told I was 53rd, (!!!!) in the queue, andI shouldn’t be unhappy because other member calls were being answered, so clearly I have no right to complain, but …. my call was important to them. This experience does not deserve the title of ’service’. It’s your very definition of lipstick on a pig.

There needs to be a zero star option for this shower. I decided to apply for my pension as I specifically wanted to take advantage of the tax free lump sum to which I was entitled (though this is not 'automatic'). I have stated throughout the process that this was what I wanted. Apparently because I ticked the incorrect box on an online form - which was not written in plain English and was - I feel - deliberately confusing - I now cannot have my lump sum because I have made an irrevocable decision! Except that was never the decision - I will be appealing and I will if necessary go all the way to court on this one. Suspect they just want to hang on to as much of our money as possible for as long as possible. Would love to know if I am alone in this particular experience because I am not an unintelligent human but they managed to scam me.

I am having to wait weeks before I even hear from the Pensions Ombudsman, and it is still a total unknown if they are going to get my money retained / stolen by Teachers' Pensions, which by now will amount to £15,000 (covering September 2025 to October 2026 inclusive). I cannot wait another four weeks.
I used to think they were just dragging their feet; but now I see they are digging their heels in. I used to think they were just incompetent; but now I see they are intransigent.
My liquid assets in my UK and French banks combined are £10k. Teachers' Pensions have retained—stolen—ONE AND ONE HALF TIMES or 150% of that. I want my money NOW, and an explanation. Why, and by what right, have they done this? Do they think I've been dead for a year since September 2025 and my identity has been stolen by a bunch of crooks working out of Istanbul or Ulaanbaatar?
The good news for Teachers' Pensions is that as Lewis Carroll could have said of me, "You are old..." and they won't have to pay out for me very much longer. But they must remember they are not philanthropists, they are not paying from their own pockets, they are not paying out of the kindness of their hearts. They are paying back to me the money I earned during my teaching career, held back from my salary at the time and kept in trust until the day I needed it, until I retired. That was fourteen years ago, so not long to go now, chaps. You are paying me MY money, and you are paying because it is your job, it is your duty, it is your legal obligation for as long as we are both on the planet.

I can only speak as a POA (power of attourney) for my father, who has dementia and is entitled to a small Teacher's Pension after his wife died. Many organisations have inadequate proceses for handling POAs, however Teachers' Pensions stands alone for their sheer ineptitude at every level. The various strands of their support - the web process, the customer service phone support and the written support direct from the Darlington team are all poor in their own right, compounded by the fact that the various strands do not seem to communicate with each other. It took me over a year dealing with this organisation before my father's pension was paid, and I think that was more luck - I happened to come across one individual who stood out as competent in a sea of inadequecy - than design. What drives me to write this review is my recent experience. I have just attempted to complete the annual review process that requires my father (i.e. me) to confirm that his circumstances have not changed. Although the letter stated that, to make the process 'as simple as possible' I should call the customer service line, this proved anything but. After an hour wait (from position 31 in the queue) I was connected with a lady with poor english language skills. She did not recognise the reference number I was given on the letter, did not recognise that I was the POA not my father, could not comprehend that the correspondence address for the claim - my address - was different from my father's address. She asked me for my DOB as part of the security process. I explained that my DOB was not on their system and gave her my father's. She insisted that she needed mine, and when I provided it she informed me that I had failed the security questions. Do Teachers' Pensions ever stress-test or cold call their own service? I pity those of you that are relying on this organistion as your primary source of income, you are emtering a world of pain!

There needs to be an option to award a negative star for Teachers Pension. What an absolute shambles, I have had no access to my pension online sine June 2026 and having spent hours waiting on calls to be supported, (I use that word sarcastically) I can still not log on.
Write in they said, having written lengthy letters and complaints, nothing is acknowledged or recified.
And they blame BT internet for the rationale for not sending codes anymore to log into your account.
Not everyone has an authenticator app or wants one!
In a few weeks the new company managing teachers pensions kicks in, IF YOU COULD login, you wont be able to for a week or so while it changes over, so goodness knows what will happen with the new company? Isnt TATA who saw M&S into the security breach by the way?
No statements, no P60, no tax code change notifications for me for the foreseeable.
Oh and like many of you on here, also received correspondence notifying me to log onto my profile to be able to read the letter, hahahaha it really is a joke.

The two-factor authentication doesn't work. It requires an authenticator app and the QR code needed to operate this cannot be read by the app. Long, long wait on the phone to deal with this.

This is unbelievably bad. I sent several messages with no reply, the last one in June 1025. Justgot a reply, September 16 2026. After navigating new 'improved' log in i was told to select 'social media' and send a new message!!!!!

I supposedly retired on the 16th August. I received my statement of benefits on the 4th August, which missed out a significant part of my pension in the calculation. I called them on the 5th, asking for it to be resolved. I was told it would be resolved by the time I was paid my first pension payment on the 15th September. On the 16th August, no sign of the lump sum promised in the benefit statement. Innumerable calls and a month later, I am no closer to getting this paid, and am at risk of losing the housing we are purchasing for our retirement. Oh, and no monthly pension payment either. When you call, and EVENTUALLY get hold of someone (my average wait is 45 minutes), they are utterly powerless to resolve anything. The only thing they can offer is to 'escalate it' to management, who will apparently pick it up within 24-48 hours. Several of these deadlines have now passed, and no sign that there is anyone left in the building - no communication, no resolution, nothing. It is absolutely no wonder they have been sacked. However, I also wonder if the new company, Tata, will be any better. In the meantime, I do not hold out any hope that the issues will be resolved during the changeover, which is approaching rapidly. Like many others, I am panicking about the financial fallout because of their catastrophic ineptitude.

Appalling service. A long winded convoluted menu which took five minutes to get through finally told me that I was 24th in the queue. This is totally unacceptable. There is no email address for complaints. I wonder why?!
I was told that I had to download an app to access my portal as they don't have my mobile number. They do have my mobile number and the website provided no way for me to input it again. I don't want the app and should not be forced to have it.
The whole system is very customer unfriendly, unnecessarily complicated and difficult to use and you can see from the Trust Pilot website the revies are rock bottom and they don't even get the courtesy of a response. The CEO of Teachers' Pensions should be ashamed to provide such poor service but is probably on a six figure salary

HORRIBLE TIME WASTE NO CONTACT
Like novice bots are running the service. I correctly entered the password and PIN, but for more than a year could not log in. Requested the password, and they sent a link, which is not reachable. Their Contact Us page is useless and riddiculs time waste. They need a teacher to teach 'em the ABCs of services!