Pensions - Articles - Just Retirement comments on FCA Pension reforms

 "Pensions exist to provide a flow of money in later life and for most retirees the sustainability of income for as long as they need it should be the top priority," he said. "We are therefore pleased with the focus on sustainable income in today's policy statement which seeks to strengthen competition and consumer safeguards.

 "Competition has been weak in the early months of the new pension rules with the majority of people failing to shop around for either drawdown or guaranteed income options. While we welcome the recommendations in this response, there is a strong argument for the FCA to take an even more robust approach such as making people opt out of receiving guidance rather than having to opt in which clearly isn't working. Given the increased complexity and responsibility on people accessing pensions, it will only be when we get a material flow of people taking either guidance and/or regulated advice before making their decisions that we will start to be confident that people really will benefit from the pension reforms."