in 2011 at age 51 I was made redundant, they paid out 30,000 tax free, and the rest went into your pension pot, I was lucky I was just 6 months under the maximum length of service for the maximum payout.
from the pension pot, I was lucky as the pension scheme I was on would only pay out early if you were made redundant once you were over 50, so I opted for the 30,000 tax free lump sum and the rest as a pension, the two lump sums paid off my mortgage - just so I was left with a 9,000 a year pension, this wasnt enough for a family of 3 to survive on so I had to find a new job, the 9, 000 gets the bulk of my non tax attracting income, so I pay nearly the full 20% on the rest of my earnings, at my new company I joined the pension fund, so will be getting a small pension from them when I retire, plus my state pension. I could have waited to receive my pension at retirement age, then it would have been higher, but opted for a smaller amount over a longer term (i think the break even point was living to 96, after which I got less in total for the smaller amount