Standard Life UK Reviews 

I have had on going issues with Standard Life now since 02/04. My initial complaint which is written here in April was upheld and I received a £100.00 compensation. Case closed ? no reopened about a week or so later as multiple payments (my regular monthly pension payment) were made to me over April and May .The problem is I did not receive all of them. My Inland Revenue account shows I received 4 payments this tax year . My SL app shows I have received 4 payments. I have received 3. My instructions to SL is one payment per month on a specific date. I have now cancelled any further regular monthly payment until this is resolved. To my counting and what I saw I believe a fifth payment was made but not received by me. All I am told time and time again is my case is urgent , has been escalated. I was asked on 14/05 if one payment that was made which was in a suspense account could be refunded to me. I confirmed same day , yes refund this to my account. I have had no notification at all if this had been done 12 days later..As far as I am concerned it has not.
Why ?.
My opinion of SL while things are going well is great. However, encounter an issue (my money missing) there is no communication of any worth. No manager from the payment team will speak with you. All you get is placated. I have today sent yet another e mail to customer service with no great expectation. I have now set up another pension account with another provider. I am very very close after 14 years as an SL customer to pulling the plug. Whatever I do I will not let this go and have every piece of communication ready to send to the financial ombudsman which I believe can get involved after 8 weeks if no conclusion reached.
Extremely poor communication , like 0 and customer service when things go wrong. Remember it’s my pension fund money missing and I feel I am a nuisance by pursuing it. My patience has now run out:

If you have a problem I wish you luck. Trust Pilot rating 3.1 says it all.
Ian

My mother has been awaiting her pension since January, every time I call to check for an update, I keep getting the same reply ‘internal system error’. This is totally unacceptable, really uncalled for. I shudder to think for the elderly who have to deal with this on their own.

The only reason I am giving any stars at all is because of two SL employees Erin and Rebecca who showed total empathy and have tried their best to raise my ticket. I put in an official complaint on the 18th of May and still nothing, no update. Not even acknowledgment that my complaint has been received by the relevant department. The systems team really need to get their act together and sort this out. How many others are potentially in this situation? I shudder to think.

My mother has had to put her plans on hold since January because of this ridiculous ‘system error’. Almost approaching six months now. If this is not resolved, I will be contacting the financial ombudsman service and potentially seeking legal advice because this is just dragging on. Not happy at all. I hope no one else goes through this because it is such a stressful experience especially for my mother who is now doubting if she will ever receive her pension? I try to reassure her many times, many times but truthfully speaking, this has been a stressful, traumatic experience.

I made an online withdrawal from my pension and they sent me an email confirming the transaction and a new illustration which showed the position after the withdrawal. I emailed to see how long it would take and they replied up to 20 working days. The next day they replied again, this time to say they had not received my request (despite having issued the documents). I have spoken to 2 customer representatives and both promised to look into it and call me back. But neither of them has.

Updated 28/05.
They have provided an explanation and the apparently the payment is now underway.

Very thorough helpful and easy to understand

Absolute bullshit. I’ve the tiniest amount I would like to withdraw but of course. Hurdle upon hurdle.. nest on the other hand amazing. Do your self a favour and swerve this lot or switch straight away..

The majority of my query was rectified online but on the occasion that I hadcto phone to speak to an advisor, the wait to be connected was relatively quick. Any advisors were friendly, knowledgeable and very helpful. I was trying to combine my pensions into 1 policy, and this has now been done to my complete satisfaction.

We have recently moved from A N Other to Standard Life, my previous experiences of pension management has been nothing short of awful! The Standard Life experience is absolutely outstanding! Amazing, easy to use App, fast, comprehensive answers to all my queries and a transfer IN I’ve been trying to fulfil for years, done successfully in days! Superb!

Very easy to navigate, staff are really helpful

I was told on 15th April that the requested lump sum would be with me in "about a fortnight". Nearly 5 weeks later, I'm still waiting. Told they will respond to my complaint "in due course". Also waiting for the £150 compensation they said they'd sent me for refusing to log my complaint about being held in a queue on the phone. The financial ombudsman gives companies 15 days to consider complaints referring to bank transfers so, with no response from SL, I'll be off to them in the next few days.

Lack of knowledge about their own pension products, failed to call back for prearranged call....... causing undue delays to take MY pension funds.
Currently reviewing for better providers.

This was a quick and efficient service and completed well within the timeframe

Needed to consolidate two pensions and take a lump sum to pay builders, was told it would take 10 days. That was a month ago. Two weeks ago I called and SL admitted to handling the transfer incorrectly and will resubmit it, it will take another 10 days but would be "prioritised."
It still hasn't been done and as far as I can tell only one pension has been transferred and the other is still residing with my old supplier. My credit cards are maxed out and the builder is threatening to down tools.
The only communication I've had since chasing SL a fortnight ago is this link for a review so here it is: I hope you enjoy your single star and its warm glow as it clearly matters more to you than your actual customers.

Super efficient pension consolidation. Step by steps comms along the way.

Very dissappointing, I rang the Standard Life company about confirming cancellation and then next day , they withdraw some money in my account. I was in a big meeting and had the text messages that i was overdrawn. The Standard Life took 12,000pounds without me knowing the cancelllation didnt they do it. Its extremely heartbreaking.

Wanted to withdraw money from my pension plan. It was a very slow process with repeated assurances that it would be resolved within a time frame and then never was.

Draw down money requested 5th April. Money paid via an incorrect method 17th April was rejected by the bank & returned to Standard Life 20th April. Monies sat in a Sundry Account, c
I contacted the 27th April requesting where my money was. Money still NOT received 12th May!! No one is taking ownership to resolve. As a working person cannot get to speak to anyone after 5pm. Speak to a different person each call having to explain everything all over again. No one resolves the issue and no one calls you back when they say they will. My pension was placed with them due to previous company found guilty of pension Fraud. Now they are just as bad. Reported to the FCA & Pensions Ombudsman again !!@

If I could give 0 stars I would.

Short summary:
I requested a withdrawal from my pension on 24/04/2026. Today is 11/05/2026. This has still not even been actioned by the team after misinformation, lies and false promises.

24/04/2026:
Stated withdrawal would take 5 working days. 5 working days have come and gone, and no action on account.
01/05/2025
5 Working days have passed (close of business) Monday. Still no action after multiple online form message submissions and calls. Now told that because a contribution has been made on 30/04/2026, I have to wait up to 5 days for this to settle into the account, and as Monday 04/05/2026 was a bank holiday, this will take it to 08/05/2026.

08/05.2026:
Now told that this will not settle until 11/05/2026, even though I was categorically told this would have settled by this date.

11/05/2026
Now being informed, it's going to take an additional 5 working days to process the transaction after the 5 additional days from the processing time. Then an additional 3-5 days for the payment to land into my account. (Honestly, you couldn’t make this up!) I halted the agent and told them the previous agent had messaged me in B&W stating this would be processed and paid out today (11/05/2026).

Phone call and end of the day to state that the payment on 30/04 has not been settled into my account yet. Honestly, I could smell the utter “BS” from here.

Now on a daily callback for the comedy show that is Standard Life. I will update this review daily on how it develops toward a resolution.

Current Outcome:
At present, my recommendation is to avoid Standard Life if you want honesty and transparency when they are handling your hard-earned money. Not only do you get vague and unhelpful responses, but you also get told false promises and incorrect timescales. I would go as far as stating they have lied to me, as I have promises in black and white that have not been kept.

I would have hoped this was an isolated incident, but I’m afraid this is worse than my previous experience in Feb 2026, where my official complaint was upheld. Seems the service is only getting worse, I’m sorry to say.

Interminable difficulties trying to withdraw one of my wife's pensions from a past employer. Standard Life's system wouldn't accept her name on the joint bank account - only mine, as I'm the first-named; their coding is incompetent in this respect.

After a week of meaningless, deflective responses via online messaging we were finally told just to go ahead and they'd sort this out at the back end. - They were given a bank statement for verification.

- All seemed to progress, and a confirmation letter appeared on the portal. Luckily I downloaded and archived this, because today (11/05/26) the account had completely disappeared from the portal! - Complete with all the messages that passed to-and-fro!

For clarity... part of what has disappeared here is evidence of their mishandling the account; evidence that might otherwise be presented to the FOS! - I find this suspicious, and it certainly engenders mistrust of Standard Life.

- There has been NO contact from Standard life via email and of course we now have no way of contacting them either!

- For clarity; as we are both partially deaf, the telephone option is NOT suitable... especially as this fails to provide a record of exchanges and is only available at inconvenient times... And that's even if their system weren't (as is evidenced by many complaints from others here here) plagued with problems.

All in all I'll be glad when we manage to extract the money and will be studiously avoiding ALL standard life products in the future...

This has been an appalling experience; my wife suffers from anxiety and is very very distressed at the moment... Formal complaints WILL be made and if necessary taken to the Financial Ombudsman Service.

Very good experience with Standard life, quick and easy to transafers no hassle thank you. Excellent!

Good communication and clear understanding of what action I needed to take to allow the transfer to proceed.