If you are in a pension scheme run by one of the top blue-chip 100 FTSE companies, experts have huge doubts whether the schemes can pay retiring employees.

Plunging stock markets lopped a whacking £65 billion off these pension fund assets during 2008 – leaving them £130 billion in the red when losses from previous years are added.

The value of the FTSE 100 pension schemes declined by 12% this year, and that could lead to pension scheme trustees ordering already hard-pressed companies to inject more funds or cash guarantees to meet future obligations.

“The only schemes that have done well have been those like Rolls-Royce, Boots and WH Smith that have been totally invested in bonds. The big question for trustees now is going to be: how are we going to get some cash put into the scheme?” said David Robbins, pensions partner at accountants Deloitte.

Employees contributed about £13 billion in to the funds this year that kept the size of the deficit down, but the drop in asset values was five times as much.

Companies have not got the ready cash to plug the deficit, so are switching other assets for the pensions to borrow against. Recently, department store and supermarket group John Lewis transferred a £128 million holding in Ocado, an online retailer, to swell the group’s pension fund.

The trouble is that any asset other than cash will hold its value during a recession, and this could leave the fund even further adrift of meeting their obligations in the future.

The Society of Pension Consultants said that some final salary pension schemes were in “material deficit”.

Society president Duncan Howorth urged pensions regulators to help companies and their pension schemes to resolve any funding problems. He said the government should intervene if necessary, even to provide guarantees to shore up schemes.