Press Releases

 People working for longer should be expected for a number of reasons. First, we’re living longer. Second, much of the change is driven by women where retirement age equalisation policies will have influenced employment patterns at older ages. Thirdly, we’re reaching a point where we’re starting to see the first cohorts DC savers retire, and many of them won’t have enough saved to retire comfortably. However, I also hope that the health benefits associated with work are starting to be appreciated too, so that some of this change is voluntary rather than required to make ends meet.

We've launched a new approach to DC investment to offset the effects of lower yields post-Brexit. Analysis of over half a million DC scheme members on our Guided Outcomes (GO) framework has shown that post Brexit, the number of DC investors who will fail to achieve an adequate income in retirement has increased from two thirds to three quarters. As a result, some savers will now need to contribute up to 20% of earnings to achieve an adequate income in retirement.

How and why do people make the decisions they do about planning for later life?  And with people now living much longer, what opportunities does this present?  These are questions communications agency like minds have been exploring.  Their new film, commissioned with ITN productions, and which was just launched at the PSLA Annual conference, explores these questions. 

The film highlights some of the key themes behind research they are currently conducting with the School Of Life to explore the psychological, behavioural and emotional barriers which lie behind ‘how’ and ‘why’ people make their decisions for later life.

61% of workers under 40 would open a LISA, and of those 23% plan to do so straight away. 72% in London would open a LISA, and 37% straight away, reflecting the difficulty for young people getting on the property ladder in the capital. The Government bonus (57%), followed by the flexibility of being able to use savings towards a first home rather than having it tied up until retirement (36%), are the main attractions of the LISA. Of those who would consider opening a LISA, 68% would save into a LISA alongside a pension, with 49% saving more to a pension and 19% more to a LISA. Those who wouldn’t consider opening a LISA cited the early exit penalty (41%) and preferring to save through a pension to take advantage of employer contributions (34%). Saving priorities tend to be short term. Saving for a home and holidays topped the lists, with paying off debt and saving for everyday living costs ranking higher than retirement savings.

Nationwide, the world’s largest building society is the latest client to sign up to the firm’s award-winning Guided Outcomes (GO) proposition;
GO is a simple online solution that helps Defined Contribution (DC) pension savers meet retirement income goals by setting an income target and helping savers make decisions to get on track to meet it. 
Nationwide’s 12,000 employees will have access to the platform, helping them save for retirement. 

Commenting on the Government’s U-turn on secondary annuities, Douglas Anderson, Partner and Founder of Club Vita and Life & Financial Services said:

“This is good news for consumers. While some retirees may feel a sense of disappointment as they feel trapped in a product they didn’t want to buy, in reality, getting value for money from cashing in annuities would have been a tall order. With freedom to sell came the risk of making poor decisions. There simply would not have been enough protection in place for consumers come April. 

Comments on life expectancy to coincide with John Cridland’s interim report on the State Pension Age

Key points:

The state pension age (SPA) hasn’t changed since 1925 (except equalisation between men and women);
Back in the 1920s, you would get 1 year of state pension for every 4 years working (and you had a much lower chance of ever making it to SPA);
Today, on average, people receive 1 year of state pension for every 2 years of working;
The ‘healthy wealthy’ currently expect to receive state pension for almost twice as many years as the ‘unhealthy poor’ – assuming they both make it to 65;

Commenting on potential pension saving tax breaks that would favour the millennial generation reportedly under consideration, Calum Cooper, Head of Trustee DB, said:

“The growing disparity of wealth between the generations is of huge concern. But re-distributing tax relief is like shuffling chairs on the Titanic.

“Changing tax treatment in this way is unlikely to effect the behaviour change needed. People will either default in to auto enrolment schemes with a little more relief, or they will not. Politically it might create a favourable impression among younger generations. But will it motivate them to save more? That’s unlikely. They’d have to save more to get more, and the issue is they have no spare cash to put aside and more pressing financial concerns to deal with.

We've hired Beenesh Googoolye and Ritchie Thomson as Senior Investment Consultants from Lane Clark & Peacock to its investment consulting practice.

Beenesh, who joins the London office after ten years at LCP, brings extensive consulting experience across both Defined Benefit (DB) and Defined Contribution (DC) investment, specialising in de-risking investment strategies, diversification and fixed income. At Hymans Robertson he will look to further develop existing client relationships while nurturing new DB business opportunities.

While at LCP, Ritchie specialised in providing investment advice across a wide range of DB schemes and insurance firms. From our Edinburgh office, Ritchie’s new role will see him continuing to focus on providing DB investment advice as part of our industry leading service.

We're delighted to announce that we've hired Adam Porter as an Associate Investment Research Consultant in our investment consulting practice.

Adam, who joins the investment research team, will lead the research on multi-asset strategies while also providing support on equities and real assets. Prior to joining Hymans Robertson, he spent four years at Buck Consultants where he was a senior research analyst focused on multi-asset, infrastructure and property investment managers. Adam has also held roles with Willis Towers Watson and RBS.

Guided Outcomes (GO) scooped the 'leading innovation in workplace solutions' prize at this year’s Schroders UK Platform Awards.

The awards, which are now in their tenth year, aim to recognise the most innovative and effective worksite platforms, which meet the needs of members, sponsor and adviser and offer a broad range of benefits and gain employees’ awareness and participation.

Canada Life announces £35 million buy-in transaction with A.G. Barr plc Pension and Life Assurance Scheme. Deal marks the third of its kind for Canada Life since they entered the market in 2015. Transaction largely funded by gilts.The deal covers over 50% of the Scheme’s total pensioner liability. A spokesman for the Trustee of the A.G. Barr plc (2008) Pension and Life Assurance Scheme said: "The trustee is pleased to have taken another important step in our ongoing process to improve the level of security of all our members' benefits. This deal reduces risk to the pension scheme, providing increased certainty to our sponsoring company, and most importantly, increased security to our members."