Where the parties are young and no substantial fund has accrued it may be best merely to ignore the pension expectation or offset it against other assets in the overall division of capital.

Where the pension rights are significant they can be dealt with either by the device of attachment (formerly known as earmarking) or by pension sharing, which used to be called pension splitting. Each device has advantages and disadvantages depending on the type of pension and its provisions, but the main difference is that with attachment the pension continues as before subject to the attached rights of the other party, while with pension sharing the pension is actually split into two funds, leaving each party to deal with their share as they wish.

An important aspect of pension provision is of course the valuation of the pension which involves ascertaining the CETV (the cash equivalent transfer value) but this is only one part of valuation, which can be complex and which a judge has described as 'at best a guide'.