Just when you thought the performance of Willis Towers Watson (WTW), who administer the Lloyds pension schemes, couldn’t get any worse, it has.
It’s now demanding that a member of staff who retired on health grounds with an aggressive form of breast cancer pays back part of her pension transfer value because it was calculated it incorrectly. She left Lloyds 6 years ago.
When you retire from Lloyds or transfer your pension to another provider you have every right to expect that your pension or transfer value will be calculated correctly. WTW has got one job, but it seems it can’t do that without messing it up. But our member is not alone. Other members of the Lloyds pension schemes have had the same treatment. There is no contrition on the part of WTW, it simply thinks it can hound members into paying back the money with impunity, it can’t. In most cases the amounts of money we are dealing with are less than £10k per member.
WTW administers the Lloyds pension schemes on behalf of the Trustee Board, and the Trustee Board needs to get involved. Any so called ‘miscalculations’ should be paid for by WTW. That will give it the best possible incentive to get the calculations right in the first place.
In our next newsletter we will tell you more about the member who retired on ill health grounds some 6 years ago with an aggressive form of breast cancer for which she’s still receiving treatment. Days before she was due to have an MRI scan to see whether the cancer had spread to her spine, she received the dreaded letter from WTW telling her she owed £59,000. There is no way she can pay the money back, assuming of course that WTW haven’t got its calculations wrong again.
If any members have received similar letters they should contact us immediately. In the meantime, members with any questions can contact the Union’s Bedford Office on 01234 262868 (Choose Option 1).
MEMBERS SHOULD PASS THIS NEWSLETTER ON TO THEIR COLLEAGUES IN HALIFAX & LLOYDS SO THEY TOO CAN BENEFIT FROM THE ONLY INDEPENDENT TRADE UNION IN LLOYDS BANKING GROUP.