Need general advice on both mine and my late father's pensions

I currently have a Pension with Mercer. I presume I also have a state pension "doesnt everyone" ?

When my father died , his pension went onto my mother. But when she died a year later. It vanished.

Does the pension he worked his life to save into just vanish. I thought it should pass onto the children?

I ask this for my kids, if something ever happened and say myself and my wife were in an accident. Does my pension not pass on...

Any help,

My fathers pension was with the ESB. Mine is with Mercer .

Normally, a pension payment ends with the death of the recipient - although most private scheme pensions will continue paying a reduced pension to a spouse until their death.

Some pension plans have a clause whereby if the recipient dies in the first few years, then his estate will get a lump sum payment which can then be passed on to his/her heirs - you would need to read the fine print to see if your plan has such a clause.

Most people have a State Pension but not all so don't presume anything. Check it out.

Can't help with occupational pension sorry, but there are a couple of experts on this site whom I'm sure will advise you

Your fathers pension was an occupational pension and the rules stated that it paid out until his death and his wives death.

Your pension is " with Mercer". What does this mean exactly.

Is it an occupational pension administered by Mercer, or a private pension that you set up ?
is it DB or DC ?

In either case, the rules of your fathers pension is irrelevant, you need to find out the rules of your pension scheme.

A lot of pension plans have a death in service benefit, so if you died now, there may be a lump sum. As someone has already said, there may be a lump sum if you died within a few years of retiring.

It may be that when you retire, you can choose what sort of annuity to buy with your pension pot, either for you alone, or you and your spouse.

In general though, pensions are designed to give you an income during your retirement, not an income to pass on to your children.