Scottish fintech Guiide has raised an undisclosed round of investment to help people create tailored pension plans that will work with them throughout their life, and maximise their eventual earnings come retirement.
The startup was created by Kevin Hollister to help everyone receive free, impartial support when organising pension plans, allowing them to create their own tailored plan that will suit their unique needs. A free pension calculator does all the hard parts for the user, building a retirement plan which includes everything the consumer wishes to use, works out the most tax efficient way to do it, and letting them test and track any plan over time.
With the introduction of the 2015 Pensions Freedoms Act, people over the age of 55 were afforded complete control over their pensions.
With financial advice being costly, and free support typically hard to come by, an advice gap was formed in which people were left without an understanding of pensions, but a notion that they must be able to get better rates elsewhere.
As a result of this people began trying to control their own pensions, believing they could secure better rates. However they did this without fully understanding what they were getting into, as a result putting thousands of pounds, and their retirement at risk.
When the Pension Freedoms were introduced Kevin Hollister, pension actuary with over 25 years experience, immediately knew people were going to need help.
He therefore built in his free time Guiide with the consumer at heart, as a go to place for people who are planning to use the pension freedoms when they retire, but don’t seek advice.
Guiide’s goal is to simplify the word pensions for many, helping them understand how to get the most out of their personal retirement fund, and help them find the right route for other outcomes. Guiide aims to help people find the right routes, and will point people in the right direction even if their offering isn’t what the consumer is looking for at this moment in time, for example, annuities or retirement advice.
Found Kevin Holister says, “I liked the human side of things, a lot of early work I did was in working out the loss people had suffered through mis-selling and letting them know. Telling someone they will be getting a check for ten thousand pounds, when they didn’t realise they had lost anything is always a nice job. Later on, working to protect people’s pensions and get them the right outcome is good work to do and was one of the motivations behind developing Guiide.”
He adds: “When The Pension Freedoms were introduced I immediately knew people are going to need help here. It took a number of years to build, test and improve and all the time I was thinking I can’t be the only person thinking this. We’re looking forward to seeing what the future holds.”