Smart Pension customers can now increase their pension contributions by speaking into their phone, following the provider’s adoption of Amazon Alexa technology.
The functionality is available through Amazon’s Echo home hub suite of smart speaker devices – Echo, Echo Dot, Echo Spot and Echo Show – as well as through an Alexa phone and tablet app for Android, although it is not yet available for iPhone.
The secure Alexa skill enables employees, who have been enrolled into the Smart Pension scheme, to ask their device to report on their pension fund size and contributions in real time. They are also able to make instant changes to their employee contribution percentage.
Customers using the Echo Show video/speaker device can also access a short introductory video that explains how an individual’s account works.
Smart Pension says the new financial technology means savers will be able to check their pension balance more easily and hopes this will help them to engage and save more. Users can also listen hands free to a quarterly investment report on their pension’s performance.
The Smart Pension skill is programmed to respond to specific directions including ‘What is my summary?’, ‘what is my investment report?’, ‘what is my pension worth?’, ‘how much am I paying into my pension?’, or ‘update my contribution percentage to x percent’.
If changes are made to contributions via the tool, known as a ‘skill’ on the Amazon platform, the account-holder and employer are immediately notified by email. Smart Pension says reversing the change is equally straightforward.
Smart Pension co-founder and MD Will Wynne says: “The pensions industry is a dinosaur which has seen very little innovation for decades – it’s time for pensions to catch up with innovations in banking and the broader tech ecosystem.
“Auto enrolment has given the industry a unique opportunity to engage with a new generation of savers, but if it’s to succeed long term, it must develop a very different conversation, because it’s a very different saving mentality.
“Digital financial tools like this are the first step towards making saving for retirement part of our everyday lives, eventually making pensions as accessible as online banking and saving for the future as compelling as a Fitbit challenge.
“It’s a cultural shift and digital innovation has a big part to play in that. Using technology to build new tools to serve our members, and drive solutions whilst evolving in-step with regulatory change is a major part of our mission.
“That is the future, where the Government’s pensions dashboard initiative and open banking enable efficient, secure flow and consolidation of financial data and assets. We could be ready for that tomorrow as our platform is built with this future in mind. But the industry as a whole is a long way from that point in the UK, so in 2018 we are going to start making strides ourselves to bring this information revolution to our members directly.
“Of course, with added visibility comes added scrutiny of bad habits such as lack of transparency and excessive transaction fees, which may mean many providers shy away from such developments. That said we have had a lot of interest from forward-thinking, financial institutions interested in collaborations around our evolving and disruptive approach to the fintech space. Expect to see more about this in the near future.”