Most Irish workers accumulate three to five pension pots over a career — an occupational scheme from a first graduate job, a PRSA opened when changing employer, an Executive Pension from a stint of contracting, and so on. Keeping five statements straight is impossible, fees compound across small pots, and you lose the strategic overview of what your actual retirement position looks like.
For many people, consolidation is the right move. For some, it isn't. Here's the 2026 playbook.
Step 1: List Every Pension You Have (Or Had)
Gather statements for:
- Current employer's workplace scheme
- Any previous employer schemes (even from decades ago)
- Personal PRSAs you've opened
- Personal pensions or Retirement Annuity Contracts (RACs) from self-employed periods
- Executive Pensions from limited-company directorships
- Overseas pensions (if you've worked abroad)
Don't have the paperwork? See the consolidation page for tracing steps. A pension advisor can also do this for you as part of a consolidation review.
Step 2: Get a Free Initial Advisor Consultation
You need a Central Bank regulated advisor to look at all the pots together and identify which should move and which shouldn't. Most advisors do this initial review at no cost in the expectation of ongoing work. See our advisor directory.
Step 3: Identify Pots Worth Keeping Separate
Not every pension should be consolidated. Reasons to leave a pot where it is:
- Defined Benefit (DB) schemes. These promise a guaranteed income at retirement. Transferring out is almost always irreversible and almost always the wrong call — especially for public-sector or older private-sector DB schemes.
- Guaranteed annuity rates (GARs). Some older pension contracts (particularly 1980s–early 90s) have GARs that are much higher than current market rates. Transferring forfeits them.
- Protected tax-free cash. Some older plans allow a higher tax-free lump sum on retirement than current rules. Transferring can reset this to current rules.
- Exit penalties. Some plans impose material exit charges within a set period of opening. Sometimes worth waiting; sometimes worth taking the hit if future fees save more.
Step 4: Pick a Destination
The four main consolidation destinations:
- PRSA — most flexible, portable. Best for individuals wanting control. See our PRSA provider comparison.
- Master Trust — 17 operating in Ireland. Pooled-asset professional governance. Often the default post-OMA landing spot.
- Personal Retirement Bond (PRB) / Buy-Out Bond — holds transferred pension assets in your own name, independent of any former employer.
- Current employer scheme — if it accepts transfers-in and has lower charges than alternatives.
Step 5: Run the Transfers
Your advisor will manage this. Realistic end-to-end timeline is 2–4 months per pot, longer if the losing scheme is slow. For DC pots from live employer schemes, it's usually straightforward. For old OMA or trust-based schemes, expect paperwork.
Common Mistakes
- Consolidating everything by default, including DB or GAR-protected pots — this can be a five-figure mistake
- Not comparing charges on the destination plan to the losing plan
- Missing the 25% tax-free lump sum rules that apply per-scheme in some cases
- Transferring without clarity on what the new fund allocation will actually be
Free pension consolidation review
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