Pension communications

Whether you have a defined benefit (DB) or defined contribution (DC) scheme, making your pension communications effective can be hard to achieve.

Pension communications

Whether you have a defined benefit (DB) or defined contribution (DC) scheme, making your pension communications effective can be hard to achieve.

Pension trusteeship

Governance

Transactions

Pensions communications

Non-pensions trust

Board effectiveness

Pension trusteeship

Governance

Transactions

Pensions communications

Non-pensions trust

Board effectiveness

Getting pension communications right requires true expertise. Our communication specialists understand both people and pensions, enhancing scheme communications to make them easier and more attractive to read whilst also ensuring compliance. Click ‘Read now’ to open our service flyer in full screen to find out how we could help improve your member communications.

Good pension communications are vital for employees and scheme members to understand – and properly value – the pension benefits being provided to them.

Defined benefit (DB) pension scheme members need to understand both the benefits they can expect to receive at retirement and how secure their benefits are. Explaining actuarial valuations and scheme funding in a clear, straightforward way is not easy.

Defined contribution (DC) pension scheme members need to understand the decisions they should take around how much to pay into their pension pot and where to invest their pension savings and how these could impact the benefit they eventually receive.

Pension trustees and employers face many major pension communication challenges – from clearly explaining pension flexibilities available to members to the careful steps needed for a pension scheme to ‘go digital’. A move to sole trusteeship may require a re-think of engagement to make sure interaction between a pension scheme and its members remains strong – excellent communications are embedded in the way we deliver sole trustee appointments so they really work for members.

Strategy & planning

We develop pension scheme communications policies, strategies and activity plans, tailored to your scheme and trustee objectives.

Strategy & planning

A clear communication strategy delivers effective communications – so this is where we always recommend pension trustees start.

We help trustees define objectives and key messages for members and consider how to measure success. We create communication activity plans to meet those objectives, incorporating both business as usual and pension project activity by building them around the trustees’ business plan.

Our strategies are developed to ensure required information is provided to scheme members in a clear and effective way that reflects best practice guidance and consistency in messaging and approach. We set the scene for members, so they know the direction of travel and won’t be surprised to hear a little more frequently from the trustees in future.

Announcements & projects

We support pension projects and scheme changes like buy ins, buy outs, investment changes and member-nominated trustee elections.

Announcements & projects

Many pension projects such as liability management, buy in/buy out, risk transfer and guaranteed minimum pension equalisation, drive the need to communicate with members to tell them what’s happening and take them on the scheme’s journey.

For example, buy out projects can come with uncertainty over the precise level of benefits that will be secured, which means communications need to be flexible to adapt as necessary.

We prepare targeted campaigns to aid understanding of investment choices, encourage employees to review their pension and be clear about the options and choices they have.

When the scheme has a vacancy to join the trustee board, we produce member nominated trustee election communications. By reducing formality and technical jargon, promoting the positives and focusing on skills rather than technical knowledge or experiences, these help find candidates who might otherwise not have applied.

Websites

We create fully responsive websites to make pension scheme information more readily available to members online.

Websites

We create fully responsive websites to give members easy access to more information and guidance about the scheme, benefits and options, and wider pensions-related topics.
 
With fully flexible layout and design, we can reflect the employer/scheme branding and make use of wider accessibility features such as read aloud. Through performing search engine optimisation, we make it easier for members to find the site and relevant content by simply doing what they do every day – searching on google.
 
The trustee and/or employer will own the site so it can be retained and repurposed as the scheme’s journey progresses. This is important as it means if you change your pension administrator or adviser, you won’t lose your pension scheme website.

Benefit statements

We draft and design personalised benefit statements to ensure employees understand and value their benefits.

Benefit statements

Annual pension benefit statements are often too long and complex, making members confused or reluctant to engage.
 
We write our personalised benefit statements in clear, concise plain English to ensure members understand and value their benefits and encourage them to look at what they have so they can make decisions about their future.
 
We share these to members by post or provide the pdfs to load onto the scheme’s member portal.

“The benefit statements have been really helpful for explaining the different retirement options to members. I particularly like the booklet style for keeping the document together – it looks great.” Pensions Manager

Newsletters

We draft and design newsletters to keep members up to date with the pension scheme.  

Newsletters

We draft and design newsletters to provide scheme members with information about the scheme, update them on its financial position and share useful websites and contacts.
 
Our newsletters provide education and support to help members make informed decisions and avoid pension scams or doing anything ‘silly’ with their benefits. They encourage members to take action when needed – for example signing up to a self-service portal, updating their expression of wish etc.
 
Our attractive, engaging design layouts can reflect employer branding or be created specifically for your pension scheme. We use member-focused tone of voice and really think about how humans read newsletters, be that in hard copy or online, when developing and setting out content.
 
We share these to members by post, via pdf to load onto the scheme’s member portal or through interactive digital versions made available online which give scheme members enhanced accessibility options, such as read aloud.

Guides & booklets

We create hard or soft copy content to explain member benefits and options.

Guides & booklets

From drafting and editing through to designing and sharing, we create pension scheme booklets to explain retirement benefits in the scheme, pension increases and benefits payable in the event of a member’s death.
 
We also produce pre-retirement communications to help members understand their options, plan their retirement and recognise any risks they are facing.
 
We share these to members and new joiners by post or provide pdfs to load onto the scheme’s member portal or website.
 
This information gives scheme members support for when they need to make important decisions for retirement. It helps them and their families know what to expect so there are no surprises.

Videos

We create videos to increase engagement and improve member understanding.

Videos

We create videos to increase engagement and connect with scheme members in a more interactive digital way.
 
Some members like to read, some like to watch. It’s important to make communications right for everyone and deliver information however employees and members want, whenever they want.
 
We can make complex information easier to digest in quick video animations or the trustees can explain the details directly to the camera if the human touch is important to your members. This provides reassurance the trustees are here to act in members’ best interests and help protect them.

Going digital

We help trustees move to online member communications in a compliant and successful way.

Going digital

Our ‘going digital’ campaigns enable pension trustees to provide information electronically to scheme members in a compliant and successful way.

The first step is usually setting up a scheme website, owned by the trustee, and promoting it in the member newsletter. We can help draft and design the other two communications required to complete the formal process. We keep the message simple and encourage members to take action. They can opt out and ask to receive paper copies if they wish.

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To find out more about how Vidett’s pension communications services can support your needs contact us.

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