Energy organisation Scottish Power launched a pensions communications strategy for its 6,000 employees to increase awareness and promote the importance of pension savings.
The organisation partnered with Nudge Global in October 2020 to form a communications strategy around financial education and pensions that ensures employees fully consider their retirement plans.
The employer aimed to make the pensions experience more personal and attractive to employees by sending them bitesize pieces of information. Scottish Power currently has two workplace pension schemes: a legacy closed defined benefit (DB) scheme and a defined contribution (DC) stakeholder scheme, in which employees contribute 3% to 5% and the employer will match up to a maximum of 10%.
Hazel Cresswell, senior reward consultant at Scottish Power, says: “We utilised the Nudge Global platform to ensure that staff were not being bombarded with complex pensions information. It was important to not overwhelm employees with unnecessary information that would not engage them.”
The platform sends email reminders to staff about how they can reach their retirement savings target, and provides tailored education on how to pay more into their pensions each month if they wish to do so, for example.
Through the programme, information is communicated in an easy-to-digest format such as short articles and infographics based on savings and retirement.
With the organisation constantly expanding its diverse workforce, this has increased the agenda to create a tailored pensions communications experience which is appropriate for all employees, explains Cresswell. "It has been an important step to ensure that all employees are starting to think about their pensions and retirement plans. The new service has helped all staff to do just that."
In the six weeks since introducing this pensions education strategy, Scottish Power has seen a 75% increase in engagement. Cresswell says: “Employees have engaged with either the emails or have spent more time on the internal pensions platform itself which is great to see. Now that we have passed the initial stage of pensions communications, we can continue to work with Nudge Global to ensure that employees are reaching their personal saving goals as we improve awareness.”
Further communications will include signposting savings and pensions more at certain points throughout the year.
Scottish Power has also used social networking service Yammer to share informal insights on how employees can prioritise their pensions and better manage their financial wellbeing. The service, which was introduced to staff in July 2018, has been an important aspect of its pensions communications strategy during the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic.