7 days


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

PASA updates guidance on dashboards data matching conventions (DMCs)

On 23 August 2022, PASA published an updated version of its DMC guidance. The updates include a call to action encouraging schemes to carry out a personal data accuracy investigation (and improvements), and make matching decisions, well in advance of the scheme’s staging date.

The updated guidance sets out details of proposed future guidance topics, which include:

  • the impact on data matching of the set of personal identifiers used when a user logs into the dashboard, some of which will be verified by a digital identity service and some of which are expected to be “self-asserted” by the user without any verification
  • options for matching without a national insurance number, and
  • options for possible matching in the event a confident but not definite match is made between a find request and scheme records.

Further developments in this area are expected during PDP’s detailed “beta” testing phase, which follows its initial “alpha” build and test phase. The PDP has recently published a blog discussing participants’ experience of alpha testing.

PLSA blog introduces “pension attention” campaign

In a blog published on 22 August 2022, the PLSA announced details of its joint campaign with the ABI to encourage “everyone with an interest in helping people have a better income [in] retirement” to tell savers to “pay your pension some attention”. The campaign aims to break through the public’s “lack of interest” in pensions and make pensions an everyday talking point. It is expected to launch in early September, and is intended to run annually for three years. A toolkit of resources will be downloadable from the campaign website once it is launched.