Independent Governance Committee
Aegon UK’s Independent Governance Committee (IGC) was set up in April 2015. The role of an IGC is to act independently of their pension provider as a customer advocate by reviewing whether workplace pensions provide value for money, challenging providers accordingly. The IGC makes recommendations to Aegon UK’s Board of Directors regarding value for money for workplace pension scheme members.
To protect your interests, the IGC has a blend of skills and experience from across the pension and customer service industries. This includes legal, pension scheme governance, actuarial and customer service expertise from the independent members and insight into Aegon UK’s business model and its customers from the Aegon UK IGC representatives. Together, the expertise and experience makes sure the IGC is able to make judgements on the value for money for Aegon UK’s workplace pension scheme members.
In 2016 the Aegon UK IGC was awarded the “Best Independent Governance Committee 2016” at the Pensions Insight DC Awards.
The judges commented that the Aegon UK IGC 2016 annual report was;
“head and shoulders above the other IGCs. It had a thorough and well thought through framework for assessing value for money and demonstrated a number of examples where it had challenged the provider in terms of charges and delivery timescales. Its report was easy to read, with plenty of pictures and diagrams to maintain interest and written in plain language.”
The IGC published its second annual report in April 2017. To read this report please download it from the menu opposite.
Who is on Aegon UK’s IGC?
Aegon UK’s IGC is chaired by Ian Pittaway and including Ian is made up of five members; three independent members and two Aegon UK members.
Senior Partner at Sackers & Partners. Ian acts for a number of pension schemes and has gained extensive pensions law experience on a wide range of issues. This includes acting as an arbitrator and as an expert witness in court proceedings. He is currently the chair of the Association of Professional Pension Trustees.
CEO of the Institute of Customer Service. Jo brings with her a wealth of customer service experience from both commercial and not for profit organisations. She has been the CEO of the Institute of Customer Service since 2009 which has enabled her to put customer service at the heart of business activities. She demonstrated this by launching the UK Customer Satisfaction Awards in 2011.
Client Director of PTL, a trustee advisory firm. Colin has more than 25 years of experience in pensions and actuarial consultancy providing trustee advisory services. As well as pension trustee appointments, Colin sits on the PTL Governance Advisory Arrangement, which offers an alternative to an IGC for smaller providers running workplace personal pension schemes.
Paul heads Aegon UK’s Workplace Business and joined Aegon UK from BlackRock, where he was a Managing Director and in charge of BlackRock’s UK DC Business. Prior to joining BlackRock, Paul was head of UK DC Business Development at Friends Life, and before that he was a Director at Fidelity Worldwide Investment, responsible for DC business development. Paul has over 20 years of experience in UK pensions, with earlier client consulting roles at PwC LLP and the IFG Group.
Dougy heads Aegon UK’s Existing Business. His career began with Aegon in 1998 and, since qualifying as an actuary in 2001, he has held leadership roles in finance, marketing, sales, and general management, including a short spell with Aegon in the USA. Dougy had a break from Aegon taking on a role as an associate director at PwC, before returning to Aegon UK in 2011 as Head of Finance Transformation. In 2012 he became Retail Strategy Director, before taking up the role of Protection Director in 2014.
*Ian and Colin are corporate IGC members. This means they're employed by companies which provide professional independent services, and Aegon UK’s service contract is with the company rather than the individual.
Terms of Reference
The Terms of Reference applicable to our IGC are available here(Opens new window).
Value for money principles
The IGC has developed its own value for money principles to reflect Aegon UK’s book of business. These value for money principles reflect research amongst Aegon UK’s customers and also amongst broader consumers which asked what they regarded as key to value for money.
The findings showed that as well as looking for low charges and good returns on their investments, customers want a choice of funds, which are responsive to the appetite for investment risk they have and that they want to be able to keep track of their policy’s performance online. These are all reflected in the principles.
Next steps
If you're a member of a workplace pension scheme with Aegon UK, then the IGC’s work is important to you. Aegon UK and its IGC work together to make sure workplace pension schemes offer value for money in line with the principles the IGC has developed.
Future IGC reports will be published on an annual basis.
Get in touch
The IGC is particularly keen to hear from workplace pension members. If you'd like to contact the IGC, you can get in touch by email at igc@aegon.co.uk.