If we want people to engage with their pensions they will need to know what they can do to improve their outcome and they will need to be able to do it easily.
All of these changes could and should be able to be made within the infrastructure of the dashboard. By using technology in a similar way to online banking, the dashboard could make topping up your pension pot as easy as the click of a button.
By encouraging people to ‘act their age’ through small steps, you are using the gratification of short-termism to achieve long-term gains. Once this goal is reached the dashboard could even show people options to accelerate their savings age and play around with retirement dates etc.
However, if you have to ring up a provider, or get in touch with your employer to increase your contributions, you are creating unnecessary barriers that make it easy for people to disengage from the process.
This is just one idea and approach, and it would certainly need to be developed further through consumer testing.
However, it is a good example of collaboration between businesses looking at achieving innovation that truly benefits consumers.
Whether it’s through this idea, the others presented at the Pension Dashboard Tech Sprint or through further innovation, what is really important is that we continue to think of ways to engage more people with pensions and savings.
Technology can be a wonderful avenue and the dashboard seems like the perfect place to test out how successful this could be.
In its current form it’s set to be a helpful tool, but if we think a bit more ambitiously, it could turn into a significant opportunity to help individuals on mass work towards better financial capability and a better financial future.
Natanje Holt is business development manager at Bravura Solutions
