On the go: The pension transfers initiative ‘Star’ will be launching an accreditation system, with providers receiving a gold, silver or bronze ranking according to their performance.
Created by not-for-profit industry bodies TeX and Criterion in 2018 and officially launched in 2019, the Star initiative aims to promote regular reporting of average transfer times and define good practice, to work towards reducing defined contribution transfer times to fewer than 21 days.
With more than 70 companies signed up to Star, the initiative is now working on an accreditation system to be launched next year.
There will be three accreditation levels, which are based on performance, a statement read.
The thresholds for awarding bronze, silver and gold rankings to pension providers will be set through industry collaboration by the Star Accreditation Steering Group, which is also in charge of monitoring these.
The annual accreditation scheme will start in January 2022 based on agreed management information consisting of at least three consecutive month’s submission of 2021 data, Star stated.
Andrew Marker, chair of the Star Steering Group, noted that this is a “significant milestone where organisations can submit their management information and seek accreditation”.
He said: “Participating organisations can submit their data from early September. It is not too late for organisations to become involved, and they should contact us in the first instance if they want to be part of this first wave of accreditation.
“In a nutshell, the train is leaving the station, but it’s not too late to get on board. The Star initiative is set to become the single, authoritative source of transfer data on how firms are performing – the output of which will be a quarterly industry index and an annual accreditation scheme for participants.”
