Annual Report and Accounts
Date:
The 2013/14 Annual Report and Accounts of the Pensions Ombudsman (and Pension Protection Fund Ombudsman) were published today, 10 July.
The report includes information on our operational and financial performance as well as case studies with examples of investigations carried out during the year. Key points of note are:
Our caseload
- There was a 10% increase in the number of enquiries we received
- We took on 1058 cases for investigation, 13% more than expected
- We completed 1115 investigations. More than half of these were concluded by our investigators and did not require an ombudsman decision
- One in three cases decided by an ombudsman was upheld in full or part
- 80% of our investigations took under a year to complete
- Cases about the actions of the Pension Protection Fund remained a small part of our work, with 60 new in the year (though a third more than expected)
- We received about 50 complaints concerning transfers blocked due to alleged pension liberation (with a group about the same receiving scheme). Decisions are expected in summer 2014
Our performance
- We responded to enquiries within an average of 1 day (our target was 3 days)
- We decided whether or not we would investigate a complaint in 6.2 weeks on average (our target was 8 weeks)
- We completed investigations in an average of 9.47 months (our target was 10 months)
- We completed 1115 investigations compared to 954 in 2012/13
Running the office
- We stayed well within budget, with costs of £3.18m
- At the end of the year we had 35 employees
You can download a copy of the report here:
Related news
- TPO sets out its position on trustees’ obligations when considering a member’s request to exercise a pre-2021 statutory transfer right from an occupational pension scheme.Date:The Pensions Ombudsman (TPO) has published a Determination concerning a pension scheme member (Mr D) who transferred from the British Steel Pension Scheme (the Scheme) to a small self-administered pension scheme in 2014. Mr D complained, some years later, that although this was in accordance with his wishes at the time, the transferring trustee (the Trustee) failed to carry out sufficient due diligence to check for scam warning signs, and then communicate the presence of those warning signs to him. As a result, Mr D claimed he had lost valuable retirement benefits.
- Deborah Evans, Chair, reflects on her first month at TPODate:In her first blog, Deborah Evans, TPO’s newly appointed Chair, sets out her thoughts on joining the organisation at such a pivotal time.