The National Association of Pension Funds has changed its name to the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association. Chief executive Joanne Segars discusses the reasons behind the decision with Sebastian Cheek.
What were the main drivers behind the rebrand?
Pensions are changing. The world is changing. The boundaries between pensions and savings are changing. One of the things that came out of our research was the altering definition of pensions; when individuals talk about pensions they are putting a load of stuff in that bucket and not just the thing they get through their employer contributing to their pension scheme. Because of that, we felt it was time for a change of direction in the organisation and if we were changing our direction and expanding our scope, we needed to have a new name to reflect that.
How did you come up with the name and logo?We had lots of different names and I was really keen throughout the process to remember we are an association and it is really important we have the support of our members. We could have just sat in our head office in London and worked through it with our board members. But for me it was really important we talked to the members, so we went out to them and they were the ones who said ‘lifetime savings’ was a really important phrase and some even said when they did their communications material they don’t use the p-word. So it is a name that came from some of those discussions with our wider membership. On top of that we had lots of creative sessions thinking about logos. We liked the fuchsia and the teal, it is nice and bright and optimistic.
Why have you kept the word ‘pension’ in the name? Why not just call yourself the Lifetime Savings Association?
We went through some of that thinking but our members are pension funds and 1.8 million employers are about to auto-enrol some five million individuals into workplace pensions, so pensions is going to be a core part of people’s retirement income for many decades to come. We have in our membership DB schemes with around £1trn of assets so pensions are a core part of our DNA and the future of retirement income, but it is not going to be the only thing and the name change is recognition that people have savings and property and all the things that go into their retirement pot.
How will the change affect existing members?
We will carry on providing them with the same great service we currently provide and more besides. One example is helping them with that big piece of work on how to help people navigate to retirement and how to help support their scheme members. We will also bring in new members including the 1.8 million employers who are about to auto-enrol.
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