The Society of Pension Professionals (SPP) Council member Matthew Giles said: "The SPP is pleased to have had some input into this guidance from The Pensions Regulator and believes it serves as a timely and practical contribution to the pensions industry’s understanding of AI. The guidance recognises the significant opportunities AI presents to improve services, support better decision-making and deliver better outcomes for pension scheme members, while rightly emphasising the importance of good governance, human oversight and accountability.The guidance provides a helpful starting point for trustees and their advisers to ask the right questions, understand the risks and embrace innovation responsibly. It is encouraging to see a proportionate approach that builds on existing duties rather than creating unnecessary new requirements, helping the pensions sector navigate this rapidly evolving landscape with confidence.”
Paul McGlone, partner, Aon, said: “This is comprehensive guidance and it will be a challenge for most trustee boards to influence practice quickly.” But these days new ideas get adopted faster and faster, and the speed at which schemes are adopting AI – and at which TPR is issuing guidance - is noticeably quicker than previous challenges such as dealing with cyber risk, which took many schemes years to properly consider. The new guidance is really helpful, particularly as it echoes our view that schemes should avoid treating AI as a standalone technology project but instead as something far more intrinsic. The extent of it will be daunting for many and, in our experience, no scheme is currently able to say that they do everything that it suggests. Schemes will need to devote time to properly considering the guidance, digesting it fully, and thinking about how to apply it in a proportionate way.
Sackers, Oliver Topping, Partner, said: “Against the backdrop of AI use becoming increasingly commonplace in the pensions industry, this guidance is most welcome. AI is a powerful tool which can help improve and deliver any number of efficiencies but, as TPR clearly acknowledges, this comes hand-in-hand with certain risks, two obvious candidates being hallucinations and cyber threats. There are also hidden dangers for members in using freely available AI to help plan for their retirement. Referencing existing duties and good governance obligations, the guidance is built around seven key principles for trustees and scheme managers to help guide their AI approach. Importantly though, as many of their functions are delegated, trustees and scheme managers are not expected to be experts. But, depending on their AI use (and that of their advisers) they might need to develop an AI policy to help set expectations. In what is an ever evolving and rapidly growing area, the guidance provides a sensible and pragmatic framework. Trustees and scheme managers should take the time to discuss the guidance with relevant advisers, assess existing and possible future AI use, before deciding on what steps might be needed next.”
TPR urges schemes to embrace AI opportunities responsibly
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