Quantity surveyor Rider Levett Bucknall has seen a marked increase in staff engagement with their pensions after it introduced an app for savers to view their pension savings and offered face-to-face meetings with experts.
The company’s 491 pension scheme members had been confused about how best to plan for their retirement, the company said, leading it to switch providers and look at new strategies.
Engagement has fallen out of fashion in the pensions industry in recent years. Former pensions minister Steve Webb recently warned of a “real danger” in returning to focus purely on communicating with members.
We were aware that many were confused when it came to pensions
Hilary Richardson, Rider Levett Bucknall
However, RLB’s switch to Hargeaves Lansdown’s workplace pension, carried out in May 2017, has yielded impressive results. Seventeen per cent of members are now contributing more than the maximum matched contribution on offer.
Where just 7 per cent of the members’ assets had previously been invested outside the default fund, 41 per cent of assets in the new arrangement have been allocated to investments other than the default.
Forty-six per cent of members are using an online account with their new provider to check their pension. Of these, a quarter log on once a month or more often.
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“We recognise the importance of our staff taking control of their own retirement planning, but we were aware that many were confused when it came to pensions,” said Hilary Richardson, human resources partner at RLB.
She said the use of technology had been key to the success of the switch. “Banking is now so easy and accessible through mobile phones, and we wanted our staff to be able to access their pension in a similar way,” she added.
Nathan Long, senior pensions analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said the advantage of app-based engagement was that it was regular and adaptable to people’s schedules. Most people logged onto the app immediately before and after work, perhaps on their commute.
“Confidence typically builds over time, which is why financial education initiatives need to be regular, so that staff can get help and guidance when they want to,” said Long. “Having access to your pension via a mobile app really ramps up engagement.”
The app will now be pre-loaded onto RLB company phones in an effort to drive engagement further.
Tech access is getting easier
Developing and distributing an app for just one company or single-employer scheme would be prohibitively expensive.
But with the increasing prominence of multi-employer mastertrusts and contract-based schemes, and the imminent arrival of the pensions dashboard, technology-driven engagement should become more achievable.
Once schemes have access to technology, they can actually make cost savings, noted James Walsh, the Pension and Lifetime Savings Association policy lead on engagement, EU and regulation.
“It’s often cheaper to engage with people electronically than by letter,” he said.
Human contact still has value
Of course, technology cannot do everything a human can, at least for now.
“Nothing can replace the value of face-to-face conversation with a professional adviser or appropriate expert,” said Walsh.
RLB arranged talks and one-to-one appointments with Hargreaves Lansdown staff when they switched providers, and are planning further sessions.
Walsh added: “It is quite an expensive thing to do, which is one of the reasons why there’s a role for technology.”
