Record numbers of older people fear they will have to work beyond the official retirement age, research has revealed.

More than 70 per cent of workers aged 55 and above said the financial crisis had left them with no option but to shelve their retirement plans. The figure was just 40 per cent in the same survey two years ago.

A cruel combination of shrinking pension pots, low interest on savings and the fall in property prices is forcing them to stay at work. The research, from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), reveals that private sector workers are the biggest losers.

Only 36 per cent of workers in the private sector have a company pension, compared to 90 per cent of public sector workers.

The research will fuel the debate about 'pensions apartheid', with public sector workers enjoying gold-plated pensions-but almost nobody else.

By comparison few private sector workers even get a company pension and even fewer get one that will pay for a decent retirement.

Without an adequate company pension, they have no alternative but to keep working beyond state pension age, currently 60 for women and 65 for men.

Charles Cotton, an adviser from the CIPD, warned of a 'ticking time bomb' for the UK economy and society. Mr Cotton said many workers do not realise the financial mess that they are in until they are just a few years off retirement. In their early 50s, he said 'reality bites' and they realise that they cannot possibly retire when they had been hoping to.

Private sector workers represent around 80 per cent of the work force but more and more are being left to face a financially tough retirement.

The survey, which interviewed around 2,000 people of working age, shows how the recession has escalated the financial crisis facing older workers. When the same question was asked two years ago 40 per cent of workers aged 55 and above said they would have to work beyond state pension age. But just 24 months later, nearly three-quarters of workers are planning to stay in their jobs at an age when most of their parents and grandparents had retired.

Tom McPhail, head of pensions research at the financial advisors Hargreaves Lansdown, said: 'The reality is that most people simply cannot afford to retire.' He urged people to 'save as much as you can as soon as you can'.

Overall the report found less than 46 per cent of people actually have a pension with their current employer.

The pensions crisis is even worse for women, who often do part-time jobs with no pension. Only 39 per cent of women have a pension compared to 52 per cent of men.

There have been growing calls for the gold-plated pensions to be curbed. John Cridland, deputy director-general of the business lobby group, the Confederation of British Industry recently called for an independent commission to investigate public sector pensions. He said: 'Taxpayers who are struggling to build up their own personal pension will be lumbered for decades by the cost of covering public sector workers who retire years earlier on risk-free pensions.'