Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department is taking steps to trace potential beneficiaries of unclaimed Armed Forces pensions via National Insurance numbers.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) conducts a financial tracing exercise for the unclaimed pension cohort using the following fields: National Insurance number, forename, middle name, surname, date of birth, and previous address if held. The tracing uses all fields to search and will confirm whether they have full or partial matches.

The MOD is expanding its communications to better reach those with unclaimed pensions, developing new online materials specifically aimed at deferred members who have not yet submitted a claim.