If you are thinking of taking a lump sum from your pension fund, you should definitely talk to your accountant to go through the tax issues. Pension lump sums are taxable income so it is important to minimise the tax you pay or the extra tax cancels out the tax relief you received while paying into your pension. Quite often, Pension Schemes apply emergency tax codes to the payments and you could end up paying 40% tax on the lump sum. But, you can get any excess tax refunded via your Tax Return if you submit one, or; you can use a form called a P55 and in theory you should receive the refund in 30 days.
