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Standard Life: Pensions reviews

Name: Pensions
Rating: 2.39 (61 reviews)

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2.62

Based on 61 reviews, last reviewed 16th Apr 2025

100% increase in 5 star reviews

in the past 90 days

No new 1 star reviews

in the past 90 days

21%

11%

10%

53%

Latest highest rating:

5

Leader in the industry Part of Pheonix Group, they are the leading provider of pensions and investments. Their app is great and I can do everything I choose on it including ... Read more Reviewed on: 16th April 2025

Latest lowest rating:

2

What on earth has happened to Standard Life Chris Canham Write a review Reviews 3.6 949 total 5-star 43% 4-star 5% 3-star 3% 2-star 5% 1-star 44% Sort: Chris Canham 61 reviews R... Read more Reviewed on: 25th October 2024

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About this product

Standard Life pension reviews written by Smart Money People like you. For many of us, our pension is an important part of our financial future. Finding a pension provider that you can trust and rely on is a must for many people. Take a look at our Standard Life pension reviews to find out what life at Standard Life is really like. If you hold this pension, we'd love you to write an honest review here too!

Standard Life Pensions reviews (61)

Review of the Standard Life, Pensions:

Awful

My father paid in £25000 into his standard life pension in 2005. Over the course of 15 years the pension fund actually lost money. They have since made it unnecessarily complicated to withdraw the funds. Keep your money in the bank. The brokers at standard life must be using fisher price trading platforms. Reviewed on: 22nd July 2020

Frustrating

Each time I have called to speak to a representative it takes forever to get through....how long is their lunch hour as according to their lame excuse it must go on most of the day...... Very frustrating! Reviewed on: 10th February 2020

Does what it says on the tin!

Fairly new to standard life pensions and I like their online functionality for viewing and managing my pension although I think it's a fairly unremarkable provider overall. Reviewed on: 9th February 2020

Reliable and good performance over the years

My pensions with Standard Life have performed at least as well as the market average over the years and the service I have received has always been excellent Reviewed on: 9th February 2020

Do t trust this company

Took growth by charging unreasonable fees. Did not follow instructions made when requested to pull out took almost 1 year. No growth over 5 years ..... Reviewed on: 8th January 2020

Easy to use

It is really easy to use their systems to get real time information on my pension. I can easily see investment growth as well as break down of contributions. The best bit is however, being able to update my details online by myself. Reviewed on: 15th April 2019

Poor returns and forced down an expensive route I don't want.

I stopped putting pension money into SL when I came to appreciate they set up individual polices for each and every contribution - 30 years gives you 30 separate plans that attract 'management fees'. As I approach retirement, the money I did put in has not grown much. Only one fifth of the growth I achieved through other schemes. Now I want to withdraw some money, I'm told the entire pension scheme will be folded - I thought you could withdraw 25% tax free and leave the rest in the Pension Plan - not so with Standard Life. They insist you buy into one of their other schemes. I just looked at the costs - Threadneedle charge 0.75% management fee - Standard Life Threadneedle attracts 2.25% management fees.......they cash in on you - worst investment I ever made. Reviewed on: 25th July 2018

Excellent long term performance

Long term performance is excellent and exceeded projections given when I took out the policy. Great communications and website. Reviewed on: 5th July 2017

Easy to monitor online

I don't have much use for servicing the pension as I just leave it to do its thing. The online service is useful to track progress and customer service is friendly and efficient. Reviewed on: 4th July 2017

Customer service not helpful but product seems fine

I have an occupational pension with Standard Life and when I was leaving my job, I inquired about being able to continue with my own contributions. I found that customer service through emailing on the website were not very helpful at the time, but when I phoned some time later, the service on the call was good. You get sent annual statements to show how your product is performing, which is helpful. Reviewed on: 4th July 2017

Plain Pensions

I have had my pension with Standard Life since my company asked me to join about 15 years ago. Since then I have taken voluntary redundancy and now I am self employed. I have been carefully advised, helped and looked after by them since then, and I have a nice little package which will suit me well when I retire or even, should I wish, when I reach 55, so I can take a small lump sum. I think their customer service is always friendly and helpful and thoughtful too. Reviewed on: 19th June 2017

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