Pcls recyling concerns

Friend mentioned that I could be accused of recycling some of my pcls (£37k received March 23) if I increase my contributions to my DC pension scheme in the last year of employment (I.e. this year). I had no idea about this and do not want to fall foul of HMRC. I took my pcls to invest in 2 cash ISAs for myself and my wife so we could lock in tax free return of 4.3% which is better than pension fund performance at the moment I have read all information but having difficulty understanding. Can you confirm, for recycling purposes, is the additional pension contributions assessed against all pension contribution (me, my employer and tax relief added) across all pensions ( dB and DC) for the 5 year assessment period. 2 tax years before pcls, the tax year received and two years after. I am a civil servant and my employer and I have paid on average about £40,000 each year for the last 5 years into a combination of my dB (alpha scheme) and my DC scheme. If I remove my employers contributions, then I have paid on average about £16,000 total contributions to my dB (alpha civil service) and DC ( AVC) scheme over the last 3 years and £20000 averaged over last 6 years This year(23/24 tax year), my final year before retirement, my contributions will only be made to my employers DC scheme and will in total ( employer, personal and 20% tax relief combined) be less than £26,000. Hopefully I have nothing to worry about since this is less than my usual contribution (i.e. £16000(combined DC and dB) +£11,100 (my intended increased contribution i.e. 30% of £37000 pcls)=£27,100 ( which is less more than my intended total contribution of £26000). Can you confirm I have used the correct assumptions wrt my normal pension contributions. Is it correct to include the total I have paid to both my dB and DC schemes over the last 3 years for assessment purposes?

Hi Stevek1,

We are not able to comment on scenarios.  
The tax rules specify the conditions that need to be met for payments by a registered pension scheme to be authorised payments for the purpose of the tax rules.
Any payment that doesn’t meet these conditions is an unauthorised payment.  
There is a list of circumstances here an unauthorised member payment arises or might arise. Have a look at the guidance at:
PTM133830 - Unauthorised payments: deemed or specific situations that are unauthorised payments: recycling of pension commencement lump sums: significant increase in contributions and cumulative basis relating to increases in contributions.
Recycling of a pension commencement lump sum involves using that lump sum as the means to increase contributions significantly to a registered pension scheme.
The recycling rule is intended to prevent the systematic exploitation of the tax rules for registered pension schemes to generate artificially high amounts of tax relief by using the pension commencement lump sum to make a further, tax-relieved, contribution to a registered pension scheme.  
When the recycling rule applies all or part of the pension commencement lump sum is treated as an unauthorised member payment for tax purposes.
 (PTM133810 - Unauthorised payments: Deemed or specific situations that are unauthorised payments: recycling of pension commencement lump sums: overview).
Examples of recycling can be found at
PTM133850 - Unauthorised payments: deemed or specific situations that are unauthorised payments: recycling of pension commencement lump sums: examples to illustrate when the recycling rule applies.

Thank you.