Income

Friends Life has launched a venture with Key Retirement Solutions to bolster the support it offers customers at retirement.

Low-cost workplace pension provider NOW: Pensions has teamed up with a specialist annuity provider to ensure all savers get the best possible income at retirement.

Data from The Pensions Regulator (TPR) shows 97% of surveyed DC schemes provide support to members wishing to exercise their open market option.

Advisers are well placed to pick up new business driven by regulatory changes to the pension system, which could also result in a boom in estate planning specialists, according to Standard Life.

Partnership Assurance Group, the enhanced annuity specialist, has set its offer price at 385p per share meaning its implied market capitalisation for its initial public offering (IPO) is £1.5bn.

Despite consumers feeling more confidence about available annuity options the vast majority are still not getting the best product and rate in retirement, Association of British Insurers (ABI) research has found.

Pensions minister Steve Webb says current at-retirement processes are outdated and asked whether we need to "do decumulation differently."

Non-advised annuity sales do not effectively service people with smaller pension pots, according to the majority of annuity experts in the marketplace.

FIVE THINGS

In this week's annuity-themed poll we ask: Should the Financial Conduct Authority review the direct to consumer annuity market?