LifeSight shortlisted for European Pensions Award

As the master trust sector continues to gain momentum – with the use of master trusts by defined contribution schemes in the FTSE 350 almost doubling since 2015 – LifeSight is pleased to announce that it has been shortlisted for the Master Trust Offering of the Year at the European Pensions Awards.

It’s a privilege to be nominated for such a prestigious award for the second year running and a testament to the progress LifeSight has made since launching over 18 months ago.

We are very pleased for the recognition of the continuous work we put into achieving not just high governance standards, but innovative, consumer-driven personalised communication to improve engagement and retirement outcomes for all our members. Nominations like these play an important role in highlighting those schemes employers can truly rely on and gives us important feedback on how our offering is shaping up in this competitive market.

So, as we eagerly await the announcement of the winner, we reflect on some key developments we are looking forward to in the master trust market – both over the coming months and further ahead.

Three things we are looking forward to in the master trust market

Governance

The crowded master trust sector is set to get a governance ‘boost’ when the Pensions Scheme Bill (expected to come into force in 2018), comes into effect. It’s a welcome move that will raise service standards uniformly – master trusts will be required to meet much stricter regulatory criteria in order to operate. This is likely to result in market consolidation but should improve confidence in the sector. We also look forward to more widespread adoption of important accreditation such as the Master Trust Assurance Framework (MAF), the Retirement Quality Mark and the Pensions Quality Mark (PQM) (all of which LifeSight has achieved) to further support the market strengthening and ensure the highest levels of consumer protection.

Innovation

The rise of technology has revolutionised many an industry from finance to tourism, and we have high hopes that this will be the year where innovation takes the pensions industry by storm. It’s an area that we are very passionate about at LifeSight, as demonstrated by our development of LifeSight Age, a user-friendly online experience for members designed to help them understand the age at which they may be able to afford to retire and what they can do to influence that outcome.

As an industry, we need to address the member engagement problem and we believe technology is key in achieving this. We look forward to seeing greater levels of innovation across the sector in areas such as pension’s communication and member engagement. We have a number of exciting projects – including personalised video statements – up our sleeve ourselves, so watch this space!

Further growth

Master trusts have become increasingly popular with employers, with our research revealing that one in six (15%) FTSE 350 companies are now using master trusts as a primary DC pension vehicle, up from 8% in 2015. As an increasing number of organisations review their DB and DC arrangements, we expect this growth trend to continue. We feel privileged to have been part of this journey from the start, and are excited to continue delivering the innovation, strength, quality of governance and management that we have become known for, as the sector develops further.