Are your employees saving enough for retirement?

With over half of UK adults worried they’re not saving enough for retirement, it’s likely some of your employees are feeling this way too. Here’s how you can support them in saving for their financial future.

Research from Standard Life shows that that more than half (51%) of people are worried they’re not saving enough now for when they’re older.

Millennials (those aged 28-43) are the most concerned generation of all, with two-thirds (66%) saying they’re worried, followed by 60% of Gen Zers (aged 18-27), and 58% of Gen Xers (44-59).

Ultimately, it’s working age people who seem the most worried about their income in retirement.

As an employer, this puts you in a unique position to provide your employees with the support they need to feel more confident about their financial future.

Help employees understand how much they’ll need

According to the PLSA, 77% of people don’t know how much they’ll need in retirement.

In response, the PLSA developed the Retirement Living Standards, which helps people understand how much money they’ll need to have the retirement lifestyle they want.

It provides a benchmark level of the annual income people will need to fund different standards of living in retirement – ‘minimum’, ‘moderate’, and ‘comfortable’.

To help your employees get an idea of how much they’ll need to fund their ideal retirement, a good place to start is to signpost them to the Retirement Living Standards website.

This can help your employees understand what level of retirement they’re on track for.

If you’re with Standard Life for your workplace pension scheme, your employees can also use our Retirement Income Tool to picture their financial future.

It incorporates the three different levels of the Retirement Living Standards so they can easily check if they’re on track to meeting their retirement goals.

Boost awareness of the state pension

It’s also a good idea to boost awareness of how the state pension works.

For many people, it’s a key building block of their retirement income, so it’s important your employees have all the facts.

Currently, the full state pension is £221.20 a week, or £11,502 a year for 2024/25.

The amount employees receive depends on how many qualifying years they have on their National Insurance (NI) record.

Everyone’s record will be different, so it’s a good idea for your employees to check theirs. You could signpost them to the Government’s website, where they can check their state pension forecast, and also how they can increase their qualifying years.

Encourage employees to check how much they’ve got

It’s important for employees to be aware that the full state pension is actually below the PLSA’s ‘minimum’ Retirement Living Standard.

So it’s crucial for employees to find out how they can bridge this income gap. And this where their workplace pension comes in.

To help employees understand how big that gap might be, encourage them to regularly check how much they’ve got in their workplace pension.

Standard Life workplace pension scheme members can easily keep track using its mobile app.

Support employees with their everyday money

Of course, a big part of supporting employees with their future finances is to support them with their day-to-day priorities too.

Indeed, by helping employees to budget for their everyday expenses, it can help build up their financial resilience for the future.

You can help by pointing employees towards tools and resources that make it easier for them to manage their money, such as MoneyHelper.

Standard Life workplace pension scheme members can also use Money Mindset to help them budget and plan ahead.

It allows employees to see all their financial accounts in one place, making it easier to see where their money’s going.

Plus, our Budget Planner helps them organise their everyday spending and budget for the future.

We based this article on a recent Good Money Moods webinar, our series of webinars that help power-up your employees’ financial knowledge.