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Advice where advice is needed
Image via Wikipedia I’ve been reading Aegon’s latest report into Incentives for Saving and the consumer research that backs it up. It makes pretty dismal reading. Im depressed that after so many years...
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Ticking timebombs in the pension cupboard
Image via Wikipedia When things go wrong in DC pension administration they go badly wrong. The old axiom is “right first time”. The cost of unravelling a mistake can be ruinous. Take the case of the...
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Make NEST the dustbin of our pension dreams?
We all like the idea of having all our retirement funds in a big pot which we can manage efficiently and value easily. But not at any price! This link takes you to a version of Aegon’s submission to...
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A message to 1.2m employers who aren’t reading (yet)!
All week I’ve heard criticism of Steve Webb for telling employers they do not need advice to auto-enroll. The other side to that coin is that the DWP believe that employers can do it themselves. It was...
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Time for the insurers to pipe down and get on with it!
I like Jamie Jenkins of Standard Life, he’s a canny operator who shapes arguments to suit Standard Life very agreeably. His style is laconic, his humour dry and his observations are succinct and to...
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Hats off to all workplace pension providers
I’ve referred earlier this week to an excellent article by Kim North in Money Marketing in which she points to the ongoing work Scottish Widows have been doing on the participation of women in...
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How can this be?
A school friend of mine, came to see me yesterday with some paperwork. He had been reviewing his financial affairs. Like me , he is 53 and had been excited by talk of the new Pension Freedoms. The...
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Aegon’s ICC – treating the customer seriously.
Ian Pittaway I like Aegon’s IGC Chair report, delivered by top trustee Ian Pittaway. It’s not easy to find and though the report makes numerous references to its readers being its policyholders, I have...
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How we sort the master trust problem
I sat next to someone at a meeting yesterday whose demeanour, ideas and the articulation of those ideas, was so impressive that I was at times scared to open my mouth. I felt in the presence of...
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Full of sound and fury…Aegon’s 2017 IGC
I hadn’t been aware that IGCs had been submitting their statements to win awards. But the first think I am taught about Aegon’s activities last year is that in 2016 the Aegon UK IGC was awarded the...
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Pot follows member (unless we want to keep it where it is).
In a statement this week on the sluggish service standards of firms administrating our Defined Contribution occupational pension schemes, the PLSA concluded The median transfer time is 11 days, and...
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PensionBee stands up to the bullies at Aegon.
“Think three months is too long to wait for your pension? So does Aegon CEO, Adrian Grace – especially when it’s his pension.” – Professional Adviser 03/15 Let my people go This story begins with an...
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Probably the best watched pension video ever
How did a pension company who nobody’s ever heard of create a pension video that’s had 25,000 views in two days? Here’s how; the company’s Pension Bee, the subject “how to transfer your pension away...
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Trial by twitter’s fine by me!
An IFA withdraws its transfer service complaining it’s the victim of “trial by twitter”. Accountability is something that falls hard on adviser’s shoulders. Because we are in the business of longer...
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Aegon stung into action by the Bee!
The repression of nearly 900 Aegon customer’s is coming to an end Let your people go! It looks like Aegon has backed down and agreed to treat its customers wishing to transfer to PensionBee, fairly....
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Aegon almost perfect – says Aegon IGC
Aegon’s IGC has produced a Chair’s Statement which reads like a corporate brochure for the Dutch life insurance company. The most used word in Ian Pittaway’s IGC report is “challenge”, but no...
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IGC Class of 2018 – the results are in – this is how your Chair Report stacks...
Red – poor, amber -ok, green-good So here are my ratings for the principal IGC reports that I can find. There may be more reports skulking out there and I’ll be adding them if they get reported to...
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Back in the bubble – how the pension industry feeds itself (but no-one else)
Looking back over the headlines in the trade press, I read a depressing litany of stories about the industry feeding itself. Aegon says it has deep pockets (to compensate financial advisers). It’s...
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How do Customers benchmark what’s good about their DC pension?
the way things were For employer’s it’s all been about inter-operability I’m returning to a question that has bothered me since the inception of auto-enrolment over six years ago. To begin with, it was...
View ArticleMember support: beyond the trustee’s pay-grade?
Since publishing this article , LGIM has made a statement on the closure of the L&G helplines – you can read the statement here The Pensions Regulator and the FCA have delivered guidance on how...
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