Pensions - Articles - Aegon comment on the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill

 “After almost a year in the parliamentary process, the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill has finally received Royal Assent. Along with stablishing the new single financial guidance body, the New Act gives individuals greater protection against pension scams and puts a responsibility on trustees and pension providers to make sure that individuals receive appropriate pension guidance or have opt-out of guidance before accessing their pension. Once in place the government will continue to review the pensions cold-calling ban to see whether the ban should be extended to other financial products. 

 “Growing at an exponential rate, pension scams have been a menace for years. The pensions cold-calling ban will do more to protect savers, but for some unfortunately it’s been far too late in the day. The sad fact is that the ban is unlikely to give anywhere near 100% protection from scammers who will simply ignore the law, while it gives no protection for scammers based overseas.

 “Once the ban is in place it must be enforced by the government and its agencies. A ban alone is unlikely to be effective. People need to be made aware that cold-calling them about their pensions will be illegal. The government must carry out a media blitz raising public awareness, not once but many times to make sure the message gets through not just to the public but to potential scammers too.

 “The good news is that HMRC is already trawling its pension scheme database and deregistering illegitimate schemes since April.”