1. Provide financial education and guidance
The first step is to provide financial education and guidance. This can help to gain a fuller picture of sources of retirement income, develop an understanding of the tax implications and what to look out for when it comes to pension scams.
We find that seminars are a very effective method of improving understanding. This is based on the analysis of hundreds of thousands of responses from seminar attendees who have rated their learning from such interventions. This can then, if necessary, be supported with helplines, interactive tools, digital nudges and modellers.
For some employees and pension scheme members (such as those working remotely or deferred scheme members), seminars may be difficult to facilitate, therefore our ‘financial guidance at-retirement service’ is increasingly popular as it provides a telephone based service. Using a structured set of questions and prompts, our telephone based guidance team will discuss scheme specific options and the relationship to other lifetime savings with employees and members, and if further support is required they will signpost to Pension Wise or regulated financial advice. A written report is created for employees/members and employers/Trustees will receive confirmation to record that a retirement guidance session took place. This service meets the Pension Regulator’s and FCA’s requirements to provide risk warnings for employees and scheme members.
Financial education and guidance also acts as a prompt for action, as it can help individuals to think about their next steps, including being able to consider all the things that they may not have thought of before, such as being able to decide if they need further support in the form of regulated financial advice.