Uncertainty will remain for pension schemes over dashboards despite today’s statement

In a Ministerial Statement today, it was confirmed that the final staging deadline for Pensions Dashboards will be 31 October 2026.

Tim Box, Senior Consultant in LCP’s Pension Research team, commented: “The announcement today of the connection deadline of 31 October 2026 is an important and welcome step, but until the forthcoming guidance is published, uncertainty will remain for schemes and this is likely to result in reluctance by trustees and managers to re-engage with Dashboards. A key question that needs to be considered is how much weight will the guidance setting out the new staging timeline carry. For example, will it be mandatory for schemes to follow this in order to avoid a “last-minute rush” in October 2026? We would encourage trustees and managers to continue to prepare for Dashboards through useful exercises such as data cleansing, which will also have benefits for other projects since today’s Statement confirms that the Government remains committed to Dashboards and that schemes will still have to connect in the future.”