11 December 2014 – FCA interim report
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recommends the development of a Pensions Dashboard which would enable consumers to view all their lifetime pension savings (including state pension) in one place. The proposal was made in their Retirement Income Market Study Interim Report exactly 12 years since Andrew Smith had the same idea (Pre-2014).
The FCA said they are aware this idea has been raised in the past [i.e. the Online Retirement Planner in December 2002] and they recognise the challenges in implementation and cost for such a project. However, the FCA said there is qualitative evidence that dashboards have been successful in other countries (in particular, the Dutch dashboard which has encouraged consumer engagement with pensions).
The FCA believes the case for introducing a UK dashboard is getting stronger. As people increasingly have multiple pension pots and other sources of retirement income, there is a greater need for this tool. The FCA report consulted on the idea, asking questions about the effectiveness of the proposal, any foreseen implementation difficulties, and how and by whom the dashboard should be implemented.
17 July 2014 – Mark Hoban speech
Following the March 2014 Budget announcement of the Pension Freedoms, former Financial Secretary to the Treasury and former DWP Minister Mark Hoban MP gives a speech at a Reform event.
In the speech, reported the next day in the Financial Times*, Mark calls for the Government to establish a central database to hold information on consumers’ finances such as their pensions.
The “Retirement Saver Service”, i.e. what would subsequently come to be referred to as a pensions dashboard (but with a real-time “find service” not a persistent database), would give consumers “confidence” to handle their expanded retirement choices.
* Also the day of my wife’s funeral after she died on 25 June – see About.