The Association of British Insurers (ABI) believes that providers and the Government must make it easier for savers to consolidate their pension pots into fewer funds. In their new policy paper they have stated that the large number of pensions has made saving more expensive and complicated for consumers, while making the administration more difficult.
In its report, the Association of British Insurers said that 21% of people aged 50 or older, and in paid employment now have 3 or more private pensions. They have three main proposals to make it easier for consumers and to reduce the number of pension pots. The first is to develop a single pensions transfer process, consisting of a common transfer form and standardised transfer arrangements. The second requires the government to reform pensions legislation so that employees can require employers who do not provide pensions to pay their employee pension contributions into a specified stakeholder pension scheme of their choice. The third suggestion is a workplace advice credit aimed at small businesses to encourage employers to provide financial advice through the workplace.
Our view
This was what new Pension Simplification laws was supposed to do and failed miserably. Instead of there being one pension tax regime there is now technically eight!
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