The Government has today, 12 March 2019, announced a ‘radical’ shake-up of advice to pension schemes to benefit savers and trustees.
According to the report, published by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), opening up the market for financial advice services used by pension schemes will “help trustees get better value for money” and “boost members’ retirement funds”.
The plans have been published in response to a recent review carried out by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which found that trustees were often “denied clear information” when accessing investment strategy advice.
Under the proposals set out today, the Government plans to improve competition in financial advice services used by trustees of both defined contribution (DC) and defined benefit (DB) scheme by ensuring:

• better disclosure of fees and performance
• encourage closer trustee engagement when buying such services
• enable more effective monitoring of compliance by The Pensions Regulator

Commenting on the CMA’s findings, Guy Opperman, Minister for Pensions and Financial Inclusion, said: “Changes we are proposing will have a positive impact on millions of people’s pension pots.
“The market sometimes restricts trustees’ ability to find the best value for money, meaning that defined benefit schemes are less affordable and more difficult to fund while defined contribution schemes face higher costs and reduced returns for members.
“We want trustees to be better equipped and engaged when accessing services which have a huge influence on decisions affecting how much their members will have to live on in retirement.”
To read the DWP’s response to the CMA’s market investigation in full, please click here.