Standard Life UK Reviews 

Advised by phoenix pensions to transfer my pension to standard life to take drawdown. No communication and waiting time to transfer is 4-6 weeks ! That’s before can even request the drawdown. I suggest look into other companies. My other drawdown with legal & general took less than 2 weeks for money to be paid.

My husband has been trying to get some if his hard earned cash from Standard life for weeks. Passed to different people and sometimes is cut off. They constantly repeat the same questions and repeat forms to send it. It .makes me really upset that they behave like his hard earned cash like it us their money. It makes me wonder just what are they doing with people's cash. I was going to put some cash Into Standard life but not a chance now. Be warned they are great when taking your .money byt not great at giving it back.

Since writing this review, my husband has received a response from Standard life thst satisfies him as we as his asked for pension.

As I’m approaching 75, I decided to leave Standard life, where my fund has done well. I wanted to combine my two pensions in one fund so it’s easy to withdraw.

I called them, they told me what to do. ( ( I just had to make a call to my other provider) The full funds arrived at the other provider within two weeks and I was fully informed .
Well done. I never expected it to happen so quickly and easily.

Great easy service transferring my pensions into one pot.

I asked to transfer in an old pension which, unsurprisingly, went well. I’m just not happy that I can’t see my pension predictions so easily.

My ex-company has sold my deferred final salary pension to standard life. I'm legally entitled to claim this pension when I'm 55 years old (yes I was born before 1st April 1973) and they are making it as hard as possible for me to get a retirement estimate. I'm really worried about when I do retire as their customer service are truly appalling and they simply don't provide me with the information I'm asking for!

The clear communication, the helpful, up-to-date information provided, and the ease of using your app👏👏

Appalling customer service.

They fail to do what is asked; they fail to acknowledge instructions; they do everything possible to prevent people accessing their own hard earned pensions.

One word to describe Standard Life: DISGUSTING

My mum had life insurance with Standard Life and since she passed away at the beginning of June, they have been terrible. It all began with a phone call to make a claim on my mum's life insurance and the girl who answered the call asked to speak to my mum!!!

I then waited around 10 days before I even received the initial form to make the claim. After several emails back and forth, I was then told I needed to get a Certificate of Confirmation as my mum didn't have a Will. I am her only next of kin and every other one of my mum's insurances had absolutely no hesitation in processing my claim. If I was relying on Standard Life to pay the funeral costs, I would have a real problem on my hands right now.

I phoned for advice on how to obtain a Certificate of Confirmation and was told 'we can't help you with that'. I now have the Certificate of Confirmation and sent it to Standard Life to be told once again, they'd give me a response within 10-12 days.

I am deeply disappointed considering that this was the life insurance my mum paid into for the longest period of time. When you are grieving, the last thing you need is a company like this messing around and stupidly asking to speak to your deceased loved one.

Totally messed up my pension transfer, made me wait. poor customer service. There is a point when people make simple mistakes and that becomes incompetent.
Wont be doing business with these clowns.

Very easy to navigate. And once you have your details of previous pension to combine into standard life, it is very easy to request a transfer. It was done very quickly too! Thank you :)

Website does not load properly, times out, crashes, then fails to process mouse clicks. Tried multiple PCs, multiple browsers, multiple days. Complaining just gets you an AI written generic response.
I would not trust these people to run a bath, let alone my retirement.

Very disappointed with this company. They take your money, yet you try and transfer your funds to a different trusted company and they put blockers in place. Take your money, but don’t want to release funds. Hell bent on ruining your retirement. Avoid at all costs!!! If John Wayne was alive he would shoot them and deflect to the Red Indians.

As a lay person trying to navigate the drawing down of a pension, the quality of the information and efficiency of action on the part of staff is of paramount importance. Some correspondents are knowledgeable, others sadly don't know which way is 'up' and peddle nothing but bs, trying to be 'nice' but raising expectations as to how quickly things might happen. From inception of the contact with Standard Life to date it has taken nearly three months to 'happen' and we ain't there yet!

The response received from Standard Life via Trustpilot graphically illustrates the above point. When I submitted my review, I provided the plan number - I only have one - which enabled Standard Life (SL) to identify who I am. Their response claims that they need more information. Well, here goes:

I first contacted Standard Life on 30th April and over the following week it became clear that my best option was to consolidate another pension with my SL pension before drawing down a tax-free sum and then purchasing an annuity. So far, so good.

Conversations were held with various parties which included an instruction to consolidate the other pension with the SL one which was to happen via an origo transfer where SL contact the other provider to effect the transfer. Come 26th June, that action had still not been taken by SL.

Having finally managed to get SL trigger the consolidation, I then was told to contact SL as soon as the drawdown hit my account in order to progress the purchase of the annuity.

On 2nd July I received a bundle of documents from SL which appeared to suggest that the drawdown was to be paid into my account on 30th June, although nothing had been credited to my account on that day. I called SL and was told that the money had only been from my other pension pot that day (2nd July) and that it would be credited to my account the following week.

The 'following week' came and went and nothing appeared in my account, so, on 13th July I called SL again, only to be told that the 30th June date was 'just an illustration' and that the money had still not been received from the other provider, a total contradiction of what I had been told by an SL employee on 2nd July. That call was initially put through to the wrong department, so plenty of everyone's time was wasted explaining the situation more times than was necessary.

An email was received yesterday (21st July) from the other provider advising me that the transfer had taken place from them to SL, some 17 working days (wd) after the 26th June 'trigger', so in line with the 15-20 wd advised on 13th July.

So, between the origo transfer not being triggered until 26th June, the incorrect information being dished out on 2nd July and being put through to the wrong department on 13th July, we are now nearly three months on from my initial contact with SL and I am still not in possession of a lump sum or a pension.

That is not good service and deserves only three stars, possibly less given SL's inability to pick up on the plan number provided with the initial review and 'reach out' to me, as the Americans say...

Never ever go with standard life . Its probably the worst mistake u could make its like beating ur head against a wall. Every person you talk to tell you something different . It wouldn't be so bad but its easier to borrow 100% to buy a house then get your own . Ive been going around in circles for over a month now. I wish I knew the hassle id have trying to get my own money and I hope this helps other ppl from going through the same debacle I have . If it improves you may never read this but if you are then it probably got worse.

Super easy, you tell them the details on the app, they sort the transfer, there’s no cost and the app updates a few weeks later once the transfer completes. Awesome! 🙌🏻

I needed to transfer in some money from an existing pension. SL made it really easy and kept me informed along the way. Really helpful staff who were knowledgeable and efficient. Would recommend.

Standard Life’s Facebook slogan is “Helping people imagine the later life they want and live retired life their way.” You have to use your imagination because they aren’t going to part with your money.
I retired at the start April and it's now July. My financial adviser is trying to move my fund to another supplier who are performing much better. We asked for the available interest free sum to be paid to me. Each of the last 8 weeks (probably longer) Standard Life have told me, via my adviser, that the money will be paid "either Friday or at the latest Monday".
After several delays we were told they didn't have all the information despite this being passed to them. I don't know why we weren't informed earlier. The data was provided the same day but the cycle of delays just continued to repeat.
I am now robbing Peter to pay Paul. A complaint was raised by my adviser several weeks ago but we still have no resolution so I also raised a complaint.

My mum is a widow. Turned 65 in January 2026. Pension was meant to be paid out then.

We are now in in July, after countless phones calls and many many hours on the phone to SL, they still have not paid out the money we are owed.

They have a mysterious 'system error' that their IT can not resolve. (Little Britain, "Computer says NO")

My complaint should have been logged at first point of contact however we have been strung along and the first complaint was logged in May.

I emailed the CEO. Andy Briggs - Pheonix group.

Obviously no response from that end as he probably is laughing his way to the bank looking at his own pension. I don't think he would be waiting this long for it.

You would think with similar reviews about the same issue - they would act on this but its all silence.

They are dithering with their 8 week FOS letter, asking for more time. Another two weeks.

I have had other pensions paid out in 10 working days. It has taken SL 182 days so far and counting.

This company is embarrassing. Trustpilot should open the option for ZERO stars.

My pension was due to be paid on my 65th birthday and all the paperwork etc was completed well in advance so as to ensure they wouldn't be any delay with payments.
I tried to contact standard life to find out the actual date the payments would paid so I could set up some standing orders. The number 08081640164 given to me by them is impossible to get through, I feel it is just a number they pass on to people to fob them off as I've been trying for weeks to get in contact with them but just get the annoying voice message.
I've left my phone number with them asking for a return call but nothing.
When you email them they reply with the same (we aim to process all requests within 5 working days) even after the 5 days have passed.
I had no other choice to go with this company as my pension was passed to them from REASSURE who are no more help as they just say contact STANDARD LIFE.
I've already put in a formal complaint to standard life with no satisfaction so now I put one in with THE PENSION OMBUDSMAN to see if they can get me satisfaction.
(Watch this space)