How to make the most of value-added financial education services offered by your pension provider

Does your pension provider offer financial education as part of its pension package? A lot of providers do. And it could really make a difference to your employees.

According to the Trades Union Congress, more than a third of workers said that their household had suffered a reduction in disposable income since the pandemic began. A lot of employers have begun to recognise this, taking note of their staff’s financial pressures and taking steps to increase investment into financial education.

Financial education as a standalone service can cost thousands of pounds for an employer. However, if it is offered to your employees as part of a pension package, it’s often free.

Find out more about how our financial education service fits into our complete workplace solution

The question is, how can you as an employer make the most out of the financial education your pension provider offers?

Understanding your financial wellbeing provider

A key element of making the most of financial wellbeing from your pension provider is to get to know the individuals who’ll be delivering the service. This means you can ask questions, get insight and ensure you’re clear on the benefits the sessions are having.

Most, if not all, specialists should have a form of financial qualification, such as the Diploma in Regulated Financial Planning, so you can feel confident that they’re providing reliable, sound and accurate guidance to your workforce. It’s worth talking to them though, to see if they’re particularly interested in certain topics, like the Gender Pension Gap or Financial Resilience for Younger Employees. Their enthusiasm in this area could go some way to motivating your members to engage with their own finances.

Many financial wellbeing providers will offer one-to-one sessions with your employees, on top of the group webinars. If you get to know your specialists, you might be able to glean information about your employees that can be helpful when planning future wellbeing sessions. Of course, these one-to-one chats are confidential, so you won’t know any specific details about individual employees, but getting to know who’s providing your service can really help you get under the hood of the types of sessions your employees might need.

Alternative savings vehicles

The advantage of ‘value-added’ financial education services is that you get a premium service, often for free. The same can be said about wider workplace savings, the continual promotion of which can compliment your employees’ financial resilience.

Pension providers often offer wider workplace savings solutions as a helpful and effective additional way to save. One of the primary benefits of workplace savings is that contributions come directly from payroll, meaning your employees can save before being tempted to spend. Workplace savings can help high earners with restricted pension limits, graduate trainees with saving for a home or young families who want to start building a nest egg for their children, among other individuals.

From an education standpoint, workplace savings are key to making the most of the financial education services offered by your pension provider. Workplace financial education often centres around the idea of financial resilience. Saving through payroll compliments being financially resilient, so make sure your provider offers these solutions to fully capitalise on recommendations given by your financial education specialist.

According to HR Review, two in five employees said they value/would value workplace savings options. This is a good starting point, but we question the level of knowledge many employees have about workplace savings options. Financial education offered by their pension provider, coupled with effective communication from their employer about these benefits, could increase that number further.

The right message, to the right people, at the right time

Is it safe to assume that you want your staff to engage with the benefits you offer? As well as helping your employees, progressive benefits like financial education can really improve employee motivation, loyalty and efficiency in their roles.

However, after months of working at home, without much (if any) face-to-face contact with managers or peers, a message about benefits may well be failing to get through.

According to HR Zone, 65% of organisations acknowledge the lack of a pre-defined budget specific to communicating employee benefits, while as many as 34% of HR and benefits practitioners say they struggle to communicate effectively about their organisation’s benefit offering.

If this is the case with your employees, you might not be making the most of the financial education sessions offered by your provider. So, what are the best ways to communicate its value and encourage your employees to engage with and improve their finances?

Firstly, think about who you’re targeting and choose the correct messaging for the right audience at the right time. Rather than adopting a ‘catch-all’ approach, categorising your employees by life stages such as early career, mid-career and pre-retirement can increase the likelihood of the relevant financial education session you’re promoting drawing them in.

Double down on your internal communications. Make sure your benefits are known and appreciated. Ideas like introducing a competitive element to attending financial education sessions, hosting a ‘Financial Wellbeing Week’ or giving your staff the opportunity to feed back on the sessions can increase engagement while showing off just one of the great benefits you offer as their employer. Just remember to keep it simple. Focus on one benefit at a time, and shout about it from the rooftops.

Ultimately, making the most of value-added financial wellbeing services offered by your pension provider is as much down to your proactivity as an employer with cultivating relationships, investing in extra services and ensuring your communications are sending a strong message, as it is about your employees making the most of their benefits.