Standard Life Aberdeen’s Alastair Black comments on FCA Consultation Paper on what can be done to increase the take-up of Pension Wise guidance – a free and impartial guidance service for defined contribution pension consumers.
Alastair Black, Head of Platform Proposition at Standard Life Aberdeen, said:
“We are supportive of non-advised consumers being given stronger encouragement to go to MAPS for guidance.
“Of course while we know advice will always give a better outcome, we also know guidance is realistically the only option available for many. A key measure of success for a stronger nudge approach should be ensuring we see more people achieving better outcomes via guidance, while at the same time a greater number taking advice.
“We think there is a risk that, if this is not handled appropriately with suitable rules from the FCA on how this should be delivered, that we may see this shift in the wrong direction away from advice, resulting in poorer outcomes for many.
“Where the FCA propose telling consumers about free impartial guidance or advice they have to pay for – the fact it calls out it has to be paid for (while of course true) risks creating a bias away from advice if consumers don’t understand the value that it can give.
“Consumers should understand that with guidance via Pension Wise they’ll still have to make their own decisions. If they can pay for financial advice, they have the opportunity to discuss and agree with an expert what would be best for their individual circumstances.”
