According to complaints filed with Action Fraud, more than £30 million has been lost to pension scammers since 2017. All types of pension pots are targeted, with some individual savers losing hundreds of thousands of pounds. Given the current cost of living crisis, more people might feel tempted to access their pension savings, making them more vulnerable to pension scams. This increases the onus on pension trustees to protect their members and has encouraged more trustee boards to make the Pledge.
The Pensions Regulator (TPR)’s Pledge to Combat Pension Scams (the Pledge), launched in November 2020, is an invitation for schemes to self-certify to TPR that they have put in place certain practices to protect members against scammers. Schemes can sign up to the pledge using an online form, which acts as confirmation that the scheme has implemented the pledge commitments.
117 pledges were made within a month of the campaign’s launch, mainly by institutions and administrators rather than trustees. However, we are now observing a growing appetite for signing the Pledge from amongst our trustee client base.
The Commitments
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Schemes must regularly warn members about the risk of scams by including scams materials in annual benefits statements, transfer packs when a transfer is requested and any member-facing communications such as the scheme’s website.
