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Hymans Robertson

DC Pension Provider Services

Key Contact

Shabna Islam, Head of DC Provider Relations

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In a fast-evolving DC market, reviewing your DC pension scheme is a complex but critical task.

Whether you have an own trust, master trust or a group personal pension (GPP) arrangement, we take an independent whole-of-market approach to help you choose the best scheme structure and pension provider for your needs.

How we can help:

We can help you review your pension delivery vehicle of choice, agree your requirements for a pension provider, assess the pension provider market against your requirements and support in transitioning to a new provider.

Our advice to you is supported by our specialised DC provider evaluation team who manage our relationships with the providers and have a deep understanding of the provider market. We can leverage our relationships to ensure that our clients put in place the best possible provider for their needs at outset and into the future. Our independent vantage point ensures that our clients benefit from a whole of market, unbiased view.

Employers and trustees are faced with several competing challenges when reviewing their pension arrangement, such as reducing risk, improving member experience and reducing costs. So which is the most appropriate scheme structure and pension provider for your needs?

Hymans Robertson really worked to understand our values and the needs of our members. Working collaboratively with us, they identified that long-term sustainability and delivering excellent value from our pension provider were our key objectives.

Retirement Lead - Global technology company

Master Trusts

Master Trusts have undoubtedly experienced a huge surge in popularity in recent years. If a Master Trust is chosen structure, you’ll be confident in our master trust experience. We pioneered the first modern-day master trust pension arrangement in the UK for Marks & Spencer in 2012. Since then, we’ve helped more than 50 clients into state-of-the-art master trust solutions and supported some of the largest DC transition exercises in the UK.

Group Personal Pensions (GPPs)

GPPs remain popular for many reasons. Compared to Master Trusts, they offer a wide range of investment fund choice, desirable by some employers. If a GPP is your chosen structure, we have an extensive understanding of the GPP market and the providers’ commitment towards this produce.

Own trust arrangements

The own trust market is rapidly in decline. The regulators have been enforcing own trust schemes to improve value for money thus increasing the governance burden and cost of running such schemes. In effect pushing trustees and employers to seek alternative structures that offer cost effective solutions, without losing too much control and flexibility. If you’re looking to move away from an own trust arrangement, we can help review your delivery vehicle of choice and run a tailored provider selection process to meet your needs.

Hymans Robertson approach was straightforward and led to significant success both in terms of delivering our needs and securing improved terms with our pension provider to drive better outcomes for our members.

Retirement Lead - Global technology company

Why are Master Trusts popular?

A Master Trust can offer a lower cost arrangement with the benefits of a well governed, outsourced packaged solution with everything in the one place. This approach can provide significant overall cost savings and brings with it time and cost efficiencies as a consequence of outsourcing to one supplier.

Economies of scale and competition in the market have driven prices down and there’s been significant proposition development, particularly around the member journey and experience, which leads to a full and rich experience for members to and through retirement. Additionally, Master Trust can often represent the most efficient method of transferring assets across from an occupational pension scheme.

It’s clear that the benefits of Master Trusts will help them continue to grow in popularity with employers, however care is needed. Low barriers to entry have led to an explosion in this highly competitive market, and with increased regulation, and the risks of investment transition, it’s never been more important to seek advice when considering a move to Master Trust.