If you follow our blogs you will recall that last year we gave you an update on the history of Pengage since we were founded in 2018. Laura started the business because of fundamental communication failings within our industry. We still believe this to be the case but we, along with many others, are working hard to correct this. It is pleasing to be able to report that on our fourth birthday we have made considerable progress on our original objective, which was to ‘Piece together pensions and financial wellbeing, unpack the mystery and make pensions fun.’
During the last year we have acquired several new clients. What is most rewarding is that most of these came from referrals from existing clients. Many of these have been within the health sector as the NHS increasingly take steps to help their employees better understand their pension options and improve their financial wellbeing.
The NHS faces numerous challenges and most NHS trusts have within their business plan a commitment to improve the wellbeing of their own people. We have been able to help a number of trusts with this as employers’ focus moves towards helping employees manage their day-to-day finances better and understanding the features and benefits offered by the NHS pension scheme.
Naturally the McCloud legal remedy has played some part in the work that we have done in the last year. The remedy took legal effect last month and we have helped a number of employers, within the NHS and other public sector organisations, to explain the background and the manner in which the remedy will apply to members’ benefits.
It’s also fantastic to report that we have ventured outside of our traditional markets. We now have two significant LGPS pension funds as clients and have helped them deliver pensions messages to their employees. This is particularly satisfying as in both cases we were appointed in preference to their in-situ actuarial advisers. We have also worked very closely with Aggregate Industries plc to deliver a series of pre-retirement webinars throughout the year and will continue to do this going into next year.
Finally our industry profile is increasing. This is a pleasant side effect of making a real difference. As some of you may know, we have a podcast known as Pensions WTAF which has received favourable feedback and we have received a number of new client approaches on the back of our podcast material. We have also been invited to speak at various pension events and this will continue going into next year.
So it has been a successful and busy year. So much so that we have recruited another member of staff, Jane Mason. Jane helps the business function day today and we are further strengthening the team by recruiting another pension consultant to help us deliver webinars going forwards.
We will continue to make a real difference and if you feel your people need support in understanding pensions and/or their day-to-day finances better, get in touch. We’d love to hear from you.
Laura, Jane and Nigel
