Standard Life teams up with OECD to explore pension challenges

According to Andy Curran, chief executive of Standard Life, the partnership will help both the pensions provider and the OECD understand the challenges facing future pensioners globally, particularly around gender, ethnicity, culture and social demographics.

By understanding what the pressure points are, and what challenges people might face regarding their retirement income, the initiative will help Standard Life create products and help shape pensions policy that improves the financial outlook for people in retirement.

We need to understand the different views of stakeholders in the world of pensions and retirement.Pablo Antolin

The OECD will look for innovative retirement income products and the guarantees provided in different countries to improve certainty of income and reduce the possibility of running out of money.

It will also assess the advantages and disadvantages of these solutions and the conditions under which they have been used.

The joint initiative will also explore how factors such gender, culture, ethnicity and socio-economic background influence savings attitudes and behaviours and ultimately the solutions and support that is needed.

Curran said: "The OECD’s combination of international reach and pensions expertise is unrivalled, and we’re excited to embark on this project with them.

"Our aim is to foster innovation in the way we meet the diverse needs and wants of savers.

"By incorporating further research on gender, ethnicity, culture and socio-economic factors the OECD will help us shorten the time it takes to enhance our propositions, taking account of the latest international thinking."

He said the initiative complements the work that Standard Life announced to close the ‘guidance gap’. As reported by FTAdviser, the company wants to encourage advisers to offer a more 'holistic' service, especially when it comes to later-life advice. 

The new initiative with the OECD will last three years, and be funded by Standard Life, which is part of the Phoenix Group. 

According to the statement announced jointly today (Friday 4), funding will help a team of OECD researchers and policy experts on pension issues to explore major challenges facing retirement savers.

The work will form part of the OECD’s programme of work on pensions. The OECD will discuss elements of the research findings over the next three years and will publish them in future editions of the OECD’s Pensions Outlook.

Curran said Standard Life will use the findings to support clients and policy makers both in the UK and elsewhere, and hopes to incorporate findings from the research project into its proposition development.

Pablo Antolin, principal economist at the private pension unit of the OECD, said retirement income, and gender, equality and diversity were areas that were "important to consider", not only in the UK but globally.

He said: "To address the main challenges that ageing societies present for retirement, we need to understand the different views and concerns of the different stakeholders in the world of pensions and retirement.

"This joint research initiative brings the views and concerns of a key player to the fore and will help us in our role of providing policy guidelines to policy makers worldwide."

Background

Last year, Standard Life published its Bringing Retirement into Focus report, as well as its Class Of 2021 reports.

The BRF report found just 57 per cent of women were confident making financial decisions, compared to 70 per cent of men, and this gap persists among younger generations.

The study, which was based on a survey of 4,896 UK adults (578 of whom were 'Generation Z') by research specialist Boxclever, found just 19 per cent of low income individuals said they spent time considering their financial plans.

Meanwhile, the Class of 2021 report warned that people were at risk of draining their pension pots too soon.

simoney.kyriakou@ft.com