Automatic transfer of employees' pensions supported by Aviva

Aviva has called for standards to support the automatic transfer of pensions when employees move jobs. The firm wants there to be a 'pot follows member' process where automatic transfers between schemes make it easier for employees to manage their pension in one place.It believes the benefits of this process include seeing the value of savings in one place, ability to monitor investment performance and track progress, better deals at maturity and low-cost charging structures.It agreed that safeguards needed to be put in place to avoid employees giving up benefits but felt that it would not be an impractical or risky approach.To protect employees, a traffic-light system could be implemented to ensure pension pots are not transferred into schemes if there is a possibility of detriment. Only schemes which meet minimum suitability requirements and are adequately protected should be used.David Barral, chief executive of Aviva UK and Ireland Life, said: "We think the industry needs to work together on automatic transfers, as creating a simple way for employees to manage their savings is at the heart of auto-enrolment."The 'pot follows member' approach makes it simple for employees to see in one place the value of the pension savings they've accrued with different employers. We believe this will encourage employees to take more interest in choosing investments and in tracking performance, particularly given how easy this is online." • Want to receive a free weekly summary of the best news stories from our website? Just go to home page and submit your name and email address. If you are already logged in you will need to log out to see the e-newsletter sign up. You can then log in again.

Automatic transfer of employees' pensions supported by Aviva

Related items