Publishing his annual report today, the pensions watchdog warned that Government ministers may have to be prosecuted over the dismal running of schemes for public workers.
Pensions Ombudsman Paul Kenny said that overall the number of complaints received last year increased, with the health service continuing to be a huge area of difficulty.
Mr Kenny said there were a number of cases last year of excessive delays in resolving rows about pension entitlements in the public sector.
There are concerns that the delays may result in employees being unfairly out of money, he said.
And the health service in particular continues to draw significant complaints about its management of employees' retirement plans, he said.
The watchdog said that legal action against ministers may be necessary to 'concentrate minds'.
'Some superannuation sections are not well resourced, which results in the neglect of the internal customer - very often, front-line staff with patients to look after and no time to follow up on their pension problems,' he said.
Although there had been an overall improvement on the year before, the health service continued to be a huge area of difficulty with significant numbers of complaints, he said.
He has compiled a list of cases, as part of his annual report, presented to the Social and Family Affairs Minister Martin Cullen.
The Pensions Ombudsman also highlighted the 'depressing number of complaints' about construction bosses either not registering or not paying workers' pensions contributions.
He said there were still cases of 'theft' by employers of contributions deducted from wages but never paid into the Construction Workers' Pension scheme.
Mr Kenny said he had been able to recover money for a significant number of workers who had been treated disgracefully by employers, but in some cases he could not because the firm had gone out of business.
Mr Kenny stressed that, overall, pension schemes were operating well with most workers getting back what they are due and on time.
Last year 439 files were opened, compared to 389 in 2005, with 61 formal determinations made, of which 32 were upheld in full or in part, compared to 76 in 2005 of which 24 were upheld.
In addition to this, 117 cases were settled by mediation and 75% of these went in favour of the complainant.
Overall, therefore, the success rate of complainants improved considerably during the year from about 53% in 2005 to 67% in 2006, he said.
Mr Kenny said he was concerned with the technical flaws in the design of some pension schemes that produce bad results for members.
He specifically referred to schemes where the cost of death and sometimes disability benefits are a first charge on fixed contributions and where the cost of these benefits may erode pension savings as members get older.
Finally, despite all the complaints, Mr Kenny said that more was done well than was done badly, and most pension scheme members get what they are due.
