7 Days is a weekly round up of developments in pensions, normally published on Monday afternoons. We collate this information from key industry sources, such as the DWP, HMRC and TPR.

In this 7 Days

Pension providers sign up to Mansion House Accord

17 workplace pension providers, managing around 90% of active savers’ DC pensions, signed the Mansion House Accord on 13 May 2025. The initiative was led by the ABI, the PLSA and the City of London Corporation. The signatories have committed, subject to fiduciary duty and the consumer duty, to the “ambition of”:

  • allocating at least 10% to private markets across all main DC default funds by 2030, and
  • within that, at least 5% of the total going to UK private markets, assuming a sufficient supply of suitable investible assets for providers.

The commitment is voluntary and is dependent on implementation by the Government and regulators of “critical enablers”.

The Accord builds on the 2023 Mansion House Compact which has a target of allocating 5% of DC default funds to unlisted equities by 2030. For providers signed up to both, progress under the Manson House Compact counts towards meeting the Accord’s goals.

PPI examines VFM in decumulation stage of retirement

On 14 May 2025, the PPI issued a report on “assessing the UK retirement income market”. The report, sponsored by TPR, indicates that people saving into DC schemes need “more help and guidance to make sure they access the right user-friendly retirement products”, with only 21% of DC pension holders aged 45 or over having a “clear plan” on how they intend to access their pension savings. The report is the first in a series examining what VFM could look like in the decumulation stage of retirement.

In an accompanying speech, TPR called for a retirement “sat nav” which “simplifies options and empowers savers to make informed choices”.

The Government intends to introduce a “Guided Retirement Duty” in the upcoming Pension Schemes Bill, under which trustees would be required to offer their own decumulation services or partner with another provider.

TPR launches innovation support service

TPR has launched a new service to support innovation in the pensions industry. It aims to reduce unnecessary regulator barriers to innovation by enabling early “transparent” discussions between TPR and pensions “innovators”. The service will offer:

  • “thought leadership”, including blogs around pension innovation and TPR’s stance on areas such as targeted pensions support and guided retirement
  • discussion sessions with TPR experts
  • collaborative events to tackle key challenges, and
  • access to the FCA’s innovation test service.

TPR intends to focus on innovation in administration and member experience (particularly in the decumulation phase), and investment and new scheme models.

PDP update on dashboard progress

The PDP has published a progress update report on its ongoing work to guide the industry through their connection journeys. Out of the 20 voluntary participants that PDP has been working with to build direct routes to connect to the dashboards ecosystem, four have completed their connection journeys. Of the remainder, five have recently completed integration testing. PDP expects that the remaining cohort of participants “could realistically complete their connection journeys in summer 2025”. PDP reiterates that both TPR and the FCA have confirmed that there will be no regulatory intervention for schemes who are unable to meet their “connect by” dates in the DWP’s connection guidance solely due to their dependence on an industry participant who has yet to connect.

The PDP has also published supplementary guidance to its reporting standards, which schemes need to adhere to when generating, recording and reporting operational information.

FCA publishes Financial Lives survey results

The FCA has published the results of its 2024 Financial Lives survey, which examines the financial resilience of consumers and reports trends over recent years. Key pensions findings include:

  • 75% had a private pension provision (up from 65% in 2017)
  • 33% of DC savers had less than £10,000 saved, with 12% not knowing how much they had saved, and
  • only 33% of DC pension holders had thought about how they would manage financially in retirement.