Higher Returns and Modern Tools: Penfold vs Scottish Widows
Penfold and Scottish Widows are leading workplace pension providers, but Penfold stands out with higher fund performance, superior employee engagement tools, and unmatched business support.
With no business fees, a transparent fee structure, and tools designed to simplify management, Penfold delivers a seamless experience for businesses and empowers employees to save for a comfortable later life.
Why Choose Penfold Over Scottish Widows?
Penfold provides a superior workplace pension experience for businesses looking for a modern, efficient, and high-performing solution.
- Better Customer Ratings
Penfold’s 4.7-star Trustpilot rating reflects exceptional customer satisfaction and service quality, surpassing Scottish Widows’ 4.5-star score. This higher rating highlights Penfold’s dedication to delivering an outstanding experience for businesses and employees alike.
- Dedicated Business Support
With our dedicated account managers, Penfold ensures hands-on guidance throughout onboarding, compliance, and payroll integration. Scottish Widows lacks this level of personalised support, leaving businesses to handle challenges independently.
- Streamlined Payroll Tools
Penfold’s advanced payroll integrations reduce admin time and ensure compliance, helping businesses focus on what they do best. This allows businesses to avoid admin headaches and save hours every month on pension management.
Fund Performance: Helping Employees Save More
Penfold delivers market-leading fund performance, ensuring employees’ savings grow faster. Over the past five years, Penfold’s default fund, managed by BlackRock, has achieved annualised returns of 9.3% (gross) and 8.4% (net). In comparison, Scottish Widows’ default plan has delivered 7.7% (gross) and 7.4% (net).
This performance difference enables employees to build their pension pots faster, boosting financial confidence and helping businesses attract and retain top talent.
Figures are net of investment fees but gross of provider fees. Past performance, actual or simulated, is also not a reliable indicator of future returns. All investments carry risk and your investment value can go up or down. Returns may increase or decrease as a result of currency fluctuations.
Figures for the Penfold Plan are based on a simulation, provided by BlackRock, of how the portfolio might have performed had these building blocks of the plan existed together over the last five years. It’s important to note that it cannot be definitively said exactly how this plan would have performed in the past. Simulations should not be taken as a guarantee of expected past or future performance, but are designed to be illustrative only. A full list of the assumptions made to generate the simulations is available and should be carefully considered.
The figures shown represent a weighted average of performance across 30 age cohorts (ages 36-65) to provide an overall view of member outcomes. Individual returns will vary depending on fund allocation at different points in a member’s investment journey, as well as personal fee structures. For consistency in comparison, returns have been estimated based on a typical pot size of £10,000 and an average salary of £30,000. Actual returns may differ due to factors such as specific employer-negotiated fees, individual pot sizes, and salary levels.
Returns are based on data collected by investment advisors DWA from a variety of sources, including individual providers and data published on Morningstar. Where possible, actual return data has been used; however, some assumptions were made based on underlying fund data due to availability limitations. The impact of charges has been applied on a monthly basis, which may create minor discrepancies with actual experience depending on the charging structure. DWA is happy to review and correct any discrepancies should further evidence be provided.
Advanced Features for Employees
Penfold’s goes beyond basic pension management, offering employees modern tools and a more engaging experience:
- Intuitive App
Penfold’s sleek, user-friendly app empowers employees to track their savings, combine pensions, and set financial goals. While Scottish Widows also provides an app, it lacks some of Penfold’s interactive features, such as savings nudges and pension consolidation tools.
- Financial Wellbeing Features
Penfold helps employees take control of their financial future with tools like savings nudges to encourage better saving habits, retirement income forecasts for clearer planning, and shareholder voting for ethical investment control. Scottish Widows lacks Penfold’s innovative features for proactive engagement.
- Easy for Employees, Easy for You
Getting stuck trying to solve clients and employees’ pension problems? Our app helps employees find and combine other pensions, and make changes to their pension independently.
What Makes Penfold Stand Out?
- Stronger Fund Performance
Penfold delivers higher annualised returns, ensuring employees’ savings grow faster and giving them greater financial security.
- Exceptional Business Support
Penfold’s dedicated account managers provide expert, hands-on guidance for businesses, from onboarding to ongoing compliance.
- Employee Engagement
Penfold’s interactive tools and focus on financial wellbeing improve employee satisfaction, boosting retention and productivity.
Penfold's user-friendly approach and transparency revolutionised how we manage pensions for our clients. Penfold has come in and changed the space, showing that we could have a pension that was user friendly as well. It's really adding value to not only the employers themselves but the employees of those employers. The app is the big selling point with Penfold, having a nice clean UI that’s easy to understand for people because the vast majority of people aren’t pension literate.
How to Choose the Right Workplace Pension
Step 1: Assess Your Needs
What does your business need from a pension provider? Are you looking for higher fund performance, better employee tools, or a more cost-effective solution?
Step 2: Compare Providers
Review how Penfold and Scottish Widows align with your goals by evaluating features, reviews, and support options.
Step 3: Plan Your Switch
Penfold’s dedicated account managers ensure a seamless transition, making it easy for your business and employees to switch.
