The Pensions Dashboards Programme is seeking feedback on how to best support the delivery of private sector dashboards, proposing to set up an industry participant group, but industry concerns over timelines and where dashboards will live persist. Feedback can be sent until 10 February.

The call for input comes after experts said last year that government delays risk making private sector dashboards unviable.
   

   

The PDP's immediate focus remains the successful connection of providers and schemes and the support of the end-to-end testing process, it noted, but said that “nevertheless, we are committed to ensuring that private sector dashboards will be delivered”. 

The programme previously involved 20 industry participants to trial the connection of schemes and providers to the central digital architecture for dashboards. It now proposes using the same approach to develop its operating model for private sector dashboards, believing there are similarities “but also some key differences”. 

It cites the fact that dashboards must offer a user-facing front end governed by Financial Conduct Authority and Department for Work and Pensions regulations and in line with the Money and Pension Service design standards, still to be finalised. 

The scope of the PSD group is likely to need to be wider than that of the group involved in connecting schemes, the PDP said. According to PDP, the aims of the private sector dashboards group may be, among others, to: 

The PDP’s desire to work with industry on private sector dashboards connection has been welcomed, but concerns over the uncertain timeline – and what this means for companies’ willingness to commit cash and staff – have not gone away. 

“Increased focused collaboration has to be a good thing,” said independent pensions dashboards consultant Richard Smith. “However, without a clear timeline for the launch of private sector dashboards, firms may find it challenging to make the commercial investment case to establish a PSD, especially at a time when there are so many other pension change initiatives calling on their resources and budgets.” 

Smith believes some firms will want to wait and see how the launch of the government’s own MoneyHelper dashboard goes before committing - in particular, how consumers use the dashboards’ data export feature, being tested this year, as the export is likely to be used to inform how DC schemes implement guided retirement solutions. 

Aside from the unclear timeline, there are concerns about pensions dashboards being kept separate from the finance apps that consumers are used to. 

“Other countries have taken alternative approaches to making dashboard data available in apps and websites that people already use,” explained Smith.  

He cited the Netherlands, where there is just one pensions dashboards but an API allows consumers to see this data within schemes’ and providers own digital services.

“Given there’s going to be [a MoneyHelper dashboard] data export, might automating this via an ‘MHPD API’ be more efficient than having multiple PSDs?” he said. “In any case, we all need to be highly focused on achieving a hugely successful launch of the government’s MHPD – without that, there definitely won’t ever be any PSDs.” 

His concerns were echoed by director of personal finance at digital-first savings provider Moneybox. Brian Byrnes welcomed the update from the PDP but also pointed out that there is still no firm timeline for private sector dashboards to go live. 

The government’s MoneyHelper dashboard is the current priority - but this is not expected until late 2026 or early 2027, meaning work on private sector dashboards will only truly begin after that.

“Given the length of time it has taken for the government dashboard to come to market, it could be that we won’t see private sector versions before 2030,” he said. 

 

Byrnes stressed that operating a dashboard will be a heavily regulated and technologically demanding task. 

“So while firms are keen to offer these tools, the scale of the work required and the uncertain timelines involved mean few will have started building anything yet,” he believes. 

  

Where dashboards will 'live' will also be key. Byrnes said: “With much of the population already disconnected from their pension savings, tools like private sector dashboards need to be delivered through familiar, trusted financial apps to drive real usage and better outcomes for people across the country.” 

   

 

Richard Smith

Samantha Seaton

Rob Yuille

David Brooks