• Pension withdrawal communications scored 4.3/5 for clarity, yet only 40% understood the investment options for their remaining pension savings
  • Redesigned communications made customers 2.5 times more likely to complete the process, with inbound calls falling from 40% to 24%
  • Friction and complexity can create greater barriers for customers experiencing vulnerable circumstances
  • Standard Life turns three years of behavioural science research into a simple four-question framework that firms can use to assess customer communications and journeys

A major three-year analysis of customer behaviour by Standard Life has found that customer understanding is less likely to fail because information is missing and more likely to break down when avoidable friction, uncertainty and complexity make it harder to identify what matters and what to do next. The findings suggest these barriers can be particularly significant when customers are experiencing vulnerable circumstances, such as bereavement, poor health, financial pressure or major life events.

The research suggests firms may need to rethink how they assess customer understanding, moving beyond whether information is clear to whether customers can successfully use it to make informed decisions. This has particular relevance under Consumer Duty, where delivering good customer outcomes depends on customers being able to understand and act on information in practice.

The findings are especially relevant to retirement decisions, which are often complex, infrequent and made during periods of significant life change. As a retirement specialist, Standard Life believes helping customers achieve better outcomes means designing communications and journeys around how people actually make decisions in the real world.

Standard Life's Understanding Under Pressure report brings together three years of behavioural science research, customer testing, experimentation and customer journey analysis, translating the evidence into a practical framework that firms can use to assess customer communications and journeys. It explores what helps people understand complex financial decisions in practice and examines how understanding can be affected when people are under pressure.

One example in the report tested a pension withdrawal  communication. Participants rated it highly for clarity, giving it an average score of 4.3 out of 5. However, when asked to explain what could happen to the portion of their pension that remained invested after taking a withdrawal,  only 40% could do so.

Emma Furlonger

Customers need communications and services that work in the real world, not just in ideal circumstances.

Whether someone is navigating bereavement, financial pressures or planning for retirement, they need information that helps them make decisions with confidence.

By reducing avoidable friction and designing journeys around how people actually make decisions, firms can help customers engage more effectively and achieve better outcomes, particularly when customers are experiencing vulnerable circumstances.

- Emma Furlonger, Managing Director of Workplace and Retail Intermediary at Standard Life

Testing understanding in practice

The report highlights a challenge for firms seeking to deliver good outcomes under Consumer Duty. Customers may say a communication is clear while still missing important choices, risks or implications.

Across three years of testing, four questions consistently shaped customer understanding. The report brings these together into a simple framework that can be used by teams across firms to assess whether communications are likely to work for customers in practice:

  • Where do I start?
  • Why does it matter?
  • What should I notice?
  • What do I do next?

The report argues that many customer understanding challenges stem from avoidable friction, sometimes known as "sludge". This is friction that increases the effort needed to find information, understand choices or complete tasks.

Reducing friction in customer journeys

The report highlights examples where improvements in communication design and customer journeys at Standard Life have led to better customer outcomes.

One case study examined Standard Life's online bereavement notification journey. Customer testing identified opportunities to reduce effort and uncertainty for people navigating the death of a loved one. Following a redesign that made the service easier to find, simplified the online journey and enabled customers to provide more information upfront, more than 80% of customers successfully uploaded a death certificate during their first interaction. Early monitoring also showed fewer avoidable follow-up contacts, with some customers able to complete the journey entirely online.

Another case study examined pension withdrawal communications involving  complex retirement decisions. Following behavioural science reviews, customer testing and redesign, a live randomised controlled trial found that customers who used the revised version were 2.5 times more likely to complete the process. Inbound calls fell from 40% to 24%, while requests for further information reduced from 18% to 5%.

Sophie Kulla

One of the clearest lessons from the research is that understanding needs to be evidenced, not assumed.

Across three years of work, customers rarely struggled because information was completely absent. More often, friction, uncertainty and complexity made it harder to identify what mattered and what they needed to do next.

Customers can feel that a communication is clear while still missing important implications or choices. For firms, particularly in the Consumer Duty era, that means going beyond asking people whether they understand something and testing whether they can use the information to make informed decisions in practice. By bringing the evidence together into four simple questions, we hope to give people across the industry a practical way to apply these principles in their day-to-day work, regardless of their role or the size of their organisation.

- Sophie Kulla, Lead Behavioural Scientist at Standard Life

Media enquiries

For further information, photos, video content or interviews, contact:

  • Louise Bryans

    Public Relations Manager, Workplace & Adviser
    Telephone

    07974 063067

    Email

    louise_bryans@standardlife.com     

Notes to editors:

About the Report:

Understanding Under Pressure draws together three years of behavioural science reviews, customer testing, experimentation and journey-level analysis conducted by Standard Life to examine how customers understand complex financial decisions in practice. The report explores how firms can design communications that remain understandable, usable and actionable when customers are under pressure.

About Standard Life

Standard Life is a retirement specialist focused entirely on retirement saving and income.

We are proud to manage around c£317bn in assets on behalf of our 12 million customers, and we champion the belief that everyone's journey to and through retirement can be better. 

With our focus entirely on retirement savings and income we want to be the business that people trust to guide their retirement journey, helping our customers achieve better outcomes and greater financial security in later life.

As a FTSE 100-listed group we are using our size, expertise and influence to shape the world our customers will retire into, and are committed to helping three million more customers by 2035, take action towards a better retirement. 

Standard Life is a responsible investor with a clear commitment to supporting a more sustainable future. The Group has achieved its net zero goal across its emissions for 2025 and is working towards net zero investment portfolios by 2050 or sooner.

Standard Life is recognised as a leading employer, with long-standing accreditation as a Living Wage Employer, Living Pension Employer and Carer Positive Exemplary Employer and in 2025 became one of Britain’s Most Admired Companies in 2025.