Case study

The RBS Group Pension Fund

Background

The RBS Group Pension Fund had a problem!

Fund members could access their records via their administrator’s self-service platform, but feedback was that this wasn’t intuitive, and made it difficult for members to find what they wanted, or to get answers to their questions.

This meant that many members simply picked up the phone or sent an email to the administrator, with issues that they could resolve themselves if they knew where to look. This in turn meant administration resources being diverted from other more complex member concerns, leading to slower response times and a less than ideal member experience overall.

But the cost to the Trustee for the administrator to move away from their standard platform was ‘eye watering’! Other member feedback indicated that whilst the RBS brand was ‘helpful as a differentiator’ it just wasn’t strong enough within the administration platform and RBS felt they wanted their digital communications to ‘do more’.

Insightful solution

In January 2019, we launched the first phase of a new website for RBS Fund members which:

  • Provides content for members that’s directly relevant to them because it’s specific to their membership category
  • Helps members easily find answers to their questions, or quickly ‘deep-link’ into the relevant section of the administration platform if they want more detail or need to take action (for example, update dependent/ expression of wish details)
  • Provides a contemporary and intuitive user experience across all key device platforms
  • Generates insightful management information around content areas, member traffic and usage
  • Introduces a distinctive, new RBS-style pensions brand which resonates with the membership without being overly corporate.

Real-world results

Uniformly referred to as ‘The Stripes’ – the site has been enormously successful, since the launch:

  • Over 35,000 individual members have visited the site – with two out of every three unique users visiting more than once
  • On average, members spend just over three minutes on the site per visit
  • Member traffic to the administration platform has more than doubled since the launch of the new website
  • The nature of administrator calls/contacts has shifted away from more basic queries, freeing up valuable administrator resource.

The second phase went live in September 2019. In what may well be an industry-first, this involved expanding a section of the member website to specifically address the needs of IFAs operating on behalf of members.

Again, the Trustees were aware that dealing with IFA queries was a significant drain on administrator resource – essentially answering the same questions asked in many different ways. The new section means the IFAs effectively also have ‘self-service’, and can find the right information quickly and easily, enabling administration resource to focus even further on more value-adding member support.

Ground-breaking, bespoke, efficient, and of direct value to both the member and the Trustee.