PENSIONS
What do pensions dashboards mean for employers and their payroll teams?
Richard Smith, independent pensions dashboards consultant, explains what dashboards are, when they’re coming and how they could help employers and their payroll teams to better support staff to plan for their retirements
"Other countries, and the UK, are currently developing dashboards for launch in the 2020s. This reflects a universal need to see all your pensions together to begin planning retirement"
What are pensions dashboards? Pensions dashboards are apps and websites which enable you to see all your different pensions, including your state pension, together on your phone, tablet or laptop / desktop computer. Many countries have introduced dashboards with great success. Last summer, I was privileged to visit five teams who run them (see https:// ow.ly/xj8H50Qu4pF for all my research tour findings). Other countries, and the UK, are currently developing dashboards for launch in the 2020s. This reflects a universal need to see all your pensions together to begin planning retirement. The UK pensions dashboards ‘ecosystem’ To understand how pensions dashboards in the UK will work, picture an hourglass shape. The top of the hourglass represents all the different pensions dashboards there will be, and the bottom represents all pension schemes and providers making their data digitally searchable. In the middle of the hourglass is the government’s central technology ‘switchboard’, enabling secure connections between users of dashboards and the schemes which hold their pensions. You could think of the sand in the
hourglass as data: it always rests at the bottom, not the top or the middle, of the hourglass: i.e. dashboards don’t store data, and there’s no central database More details on the ecosystem are available on the Pensions Dashboards Programme (PDP) website, here: https:// ow.ly/SUqG50Qu4xV. Which organisations will provide dashboards? Pension providers realise the importance of showing their customers and members all their pensions together. This is why Standard Life, part of Phoenix Group
(the UK’s largest long-term savings and retirement business), announced in September its plans to launch a dashboard. See the associated press release here: https://ow.ly/tL1Z50Qu4A9. Lloyds Bank has also said it will definitely host pensions dashboards on its banking apps. During 2024/25, expect many more providers to announce their plans to launch a dashboard. Evidence from Norway (see graph to the right) suggests commercial dashboards will be by far the most used, as consumers want the ease of seeing all their pensions on apps they already use and trust.
Multiple Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)-regulated commercial pensions dashboards, and the government’s own MoneyHelper pensions dashboard from the Money and Pensions Service (MaPS). Central digital architecture (CDA) or technology ‘switchboard’ operated by the government’s PDP which is another part of MaPS. All pension schemes and providers, who, by law, must make the data they hold digitally searchable, connecting to the CDA, often with an integrated service provider partner.
A highly simplified depiction of the UK pensions dashboards ecosystem
| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward | March 2024 | Issue 98 50
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