Agenda

08.30 – 08.55: Registration and refreshments

08.55 – 9.00: Chair’s opening remarks
Jerry Gandhi, Director, CAP Services

09.00 – 09.30: OPENING KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Pensions dashboards progress update
Chris Curry, Principal, Pensions Dashboards Programme (PDP)

Pensions dashboards will be a vital tool in helping people plan for retirement. Chris Curry, Principal at the Pensions Dashboards Programme (PDP), will provide an overview on what dashboards are and how they will enhance engagement with pensions savings. With connection to the dashboards ecosystem now underway, he will give an update on PDP’s progress, as well as looking ahead to consumer testing of the state-provided MoneyHelper pensions dashboard.

09.30 - 10.00: CASE STUDY - From theory to reality: Implementing a run-on solution in practice
Ajeet Manjrekar, Head of UK Client Solutions, Schroders

With increasing focus on endgame strategies, many DB schemes are exploring run-on solutions as a compelling alternative to full buyout. But what does this look like in practice?

In this session, Schroders will share insights from the recent implementation of a run-on solution in its own pension scheme, the Schroders Retirement Benefit Scheme. We’ll take you through the key considerations, and outcomes of our approach—providing a real-world perspective on how schemes can secure long-term member outcomes while retaining strategic control.

Join us as we move beyond theory and bring run-on solutions to life, offering practical lessons and actionable insights for trustees, sponsors, and consultants navigating the evolving endgame landscape.

10.00 – 10.30: How to assess your governance framework
Claire Barnes, Client Director & Head of Governance, Vidett

Hopefully most trustee boards will have started looking at their Effective System of Governance (ESoG) and some will be considering how to review it as part of carrying out an Own Risk Assessment (ORA). This can be through your own review and feedback, as an independent view or a mixture of both. Claire will go through case studies of assessing how well trustee boards (and their advisers) work together, checking advisers are following their own processes correctly and ensuring implementation of certain policies through collaboratively working.

10.30 – 11.00: How, and when, DB run-on strategies can work
Steve Hodder, Partner, LCP

DB scheme run-on has been the talk of the town over recent years. This session will delve into practical experience of implementing run-on strategies: How can they benefit members and sponsors? In what circumstances can they work? What are the keys to implementation? What do they mean for investment strategy? And perhaps most timely: will new Government policy changes make things easier?

11.00 – 11.30 Coffee break

11.30 – 12.00: Trade Finance – an opportunity for uncorrelated diversified returns
Maarten Offeringa, Portfolio Manager, Senior Investment Analyst, Federated Hermes

Trade Finance plays a vital role in facilitating global trade flows. In this session, we will discuss the workings of this source of uncorrelated alpha and find out why investors increasingly consider this asset class as a diversifier in their portfolios.

12.00 - 12.30: DB endgame – an insurer view
Ross Breckon, Business Development Manager, Just Group
Rob Mechem, Director DB Commercial, Just Group

With schemes continuing to see improved funding levels, this session will focus on how an insurer views the DB landscape, things trustees should be considering when looking at their pension scheme in the new world alongside the risks and benefits of derisking further.

12.30 – 13.00: Pensions dashboards: What happens when the first saver logs in?
Mark Adamson, Commercial Director, UK, Lumera
Maurice Titley, Commercial Director (Data and Dashboards), Lumera

Pensions dashboards are moving from concept to reality – and for schemes and administrators, the first savers will be logging on and finding their pensions shortly as part of the Citizen User Testing phase.

In this session, we’ll walk through what actually happens when a saver engages with dashboards. We’ll show the journey from a saver’s perspective, illustrating how that single interaction sets off a chain of matching, responses, and reporting for schemes and their administrators.

We’ll explore the critical reporting obligations tied to dashboards usage – what schemes need to track, how activity needs to be reported, and how we expect it to be monitored by regulators. By grounding these topics in a practical walkthrough and regulatory context, we’ll help schemes prepare for dashboards in the wild.

Key Takeaways

• Schemes need robust MI processes in place from day one of User Testing, as their dashboards duties apply.
• ISPs must be able to provide per-scheme reporting to support compliance and breach reporting.
• Using possible matching effectively can reduce administrative burden while still meeting regulatory obligations.
  
  

13.00 – 14.00: Lunch break

14.00 – 14.30: Session details to be announced

14.30 – 15.00: Guest speaker: Julian Lyne, Interim Executive Director of Market Oversight, The Pensions Regulator (TPR)

Julian Lyne (recently appointed as interim Executive Director of Market Oversight) will be addressing conference on the latest developments in TPR’s regulatory work. As a recent appointee he will reflect on his first few weeks and how TPR is changing in its determination to regulate a changing market in an effective and innovative way.

15.00 – 15.30: Session details to be announced

15.30 – 16.00: Closing keynote speaker: View from the PLSA
Joe Dabrowski, Deputy Director - Policy, Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA)

The Pensions Schemes Bill will introduce sweeping changes that will shape the future of the sector for the next 10 years. The next stage of the Pension Review is also expected to tackle the question of Pensions Adequacy. What does this mean for saver outcomes, and in particular the rapidly growing and consolidating DC sector?

16.00: Close of conference and drinks reception

Full agenda to be announced...