Standard Life UK Reviews 

Very helpful friendly person on end of phone, talked me through opening an account without any problems.

The process of setting up an Annuity policy with Standard Life has proved very frustrating.
I was issued a quote which I accepted thinking the process would be relatively quick and simple. I was contacted some weeks late telling me the quote was no longer valid and was issued another quote, again accepted. At this time I contacted SL and spoke with a lady called Becky who explained what would happen and when - none of which has.
Worse than that, all follow up calls to the contact number provided are never answered, no matter how long you hold for - instead you have to send an email in the vague expectation someone will reply.
In the meantime it seems that my second quote will now be out of date simply because SL are so inefficient.
I would like to complain about customer service - but there isn't any - they just don't appear to care and it seems impossible to contact them.
Andy Briggs MBE, if you think this is an acceptable way of running a company you need to get out and talk to people.

I don't know why, after making my request to cash my small pot for an emergency surgery, Standard Life blocked me on the app , an email communication (like usually )with them is impossible to have anymore , and all this after I gave them my UK bank details, and that is frightening me 🙏

Very prompt service. Staff is friendly and helpful. Would recommend SL

18 months of employer and employee contributions paid incorrectly losing thousands of £ in contributions and ultimately interest. Numerous phone calls and discussions over that time where inaccurate information was given, being old everything was fine and correct, only to be told be another employee there was a technical problem. Complaint process achieved nothing and i'm now 8 weeks into the complaint process with the Financial Ombudsman. Wide spread issues with many colleagues under the same workplace pension scheme. Would avoid wherever possible

It’s just mistake after mistake with this company. They can’t do a simple thing like change your bank account details. 14 days passed and they still haven’t done it. Customer service is extremely poor. The management ??? are not interested and seem to sit all day with their heads in a pile of sand. I’m moving my portfolio somewhere that’s not part of the useless Phoenix group.

Appalling and borderline illegal customer service!My husband had a lifelong pension scheme that Standard Life is now withholding when he wants to retire!! We are due to move house and require cash from his lump sum and six weeks into the legal two months processing period we still have nothing! My advice is start transferring your pension portfolio to another company NOW. It might take a long time but you may be able to access it in a timely manner when you need it. This incompetence is likely going to to cost us the sale of our property plus the purchase of our dream retirement home and significant legal fees. If all this catastrophic failure occurs then I will ensure Standard Life will compensate us for ALL the financial costs and for the distress it has caused us. Plus my husband will transfer the all funds into his Aviva pension fund which is performing much better. BE WARNED ABOUT STANDARD LIFE!

Very poor speed of paying out pension funds when sourced through the app.

So simple and easy to use. Literally took 2 minutes to complete and standard life done the rest.

I have a Standard Life offshore bond. I have had it for 20 years, and have been regretting it for most of that time. Finally I am writing about it. These are the reasons I strongly recommend you don't use this company.

i) Limited range of funds. They do have a lot of funds to choose from, but invariably when you look for funds recommended on the internet, they are not available from SL
ii) When you want to move funds, it takes over two weeks for Standard Life administration to do it. Imagine how that would affect the value of your holdings in the event of a market crash
iii) When I ask to withdraw money, I am told that I have to have certified documents, as proof for money laundering purposes. Certification can cost £50 per document. The money has been invested for 20 years and administered by Standard Life. How can it possibly be money laundering? It is the responsibility of a financial institution to check that money coming in has come from a valid source - not that of the sending company, particularly when the money has been there for many years
iv) The annual administration costs for Standard Life are high
v) The fund checker provided by SL is really poor. For instance you can list funds by order of performance, but when you then want to look at, say, charges and click on that tab the list switches to alphabetical order. you have lost the fund you were looking at
v) It is not possible to move administrator without cashing in the bond and incurring tax, so be very careful when you choose a product such as this (from any company). You cannot move, and could be stuck with a company like Standard Life as I am
vi) The ratio of good reviews and bad for Standard Life is around 50/50. Canada life, Utmost, and RL360 have hugely better good to bad review ratios. I have not tried these companies but Trust Pilot ratings point the way

Please consider these things and take time to make a comparison between providers. I do not recommend Standard Life

Updating my earlier complain of the 20th ofAugust, similar to others - I I received a response from Standard Life which so far has led to nothing. The Withdrawal for my money from weeks ago, still has not come through and I am none the wiser what is going on. I do not see the point if their responding when says later there has still been no movement. I have also called their customer complaints and same story. It is very concerning...
I am not sure what is going on at standard life pensions but it sure feels odd and is making me anxious.
Withdrawals from the tax free portion of my pension have gone from taking 3/4 days to taking 10 days and now it's making much longer and more concerning is that 2 days ago it allowed me process a new withdrawal (which you can't do when another one is in process) and the first one still hasn't come through.
I am up at night worrying what is going on and what it could end up becoming....

I have not been satisfied with this trading platform. Ten of Ten offers a more convenient trading service and a more straightforward withdrawal process.

SL have dealt with my pension and kept it simple, there is a personable person at the end of the phone, but what I also found great was their messaging service 😀 good work SL

TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!!! DO NOT USE THEM!!!!
I have been trying to move my previous job pension into my SL consolidated pension pot. They made a mistake with my name, which I already highlighted and sent an email from both providers. I have email SL every week. The request is over 8 weeks old. They have not ratified their mistake, they have not acknowledge their mistake. My money is still on hold and not moving anywhere. Until now I liked the pension. After this TERRIBLE experience, I'm changing my pension provider IMMEDITALY!

Its been 3 months since I asked standard life to take the money from my account after I mistakenly drew it all out and went to my bank account so got in touch with them to have it returned, they were happy to do this for me as I have health problems, 3 months on and still waiting for it to be returned to standard life, they keep fobbing me off everytime, i call them by either blocking me or leaving me a message saying they called me this morning and no need to call as they will call back ( total lies) im one of the most honest gentlemen going and I expect it in return but not getting it back. I called them this morning to ask if there's any news of it being sorted but getting same answer so said I will cancel standard life and can you please return it all to my bank account, just wait for the email that may never arrive, im 69 yrs old and health not great, can't help thinking do standard life want me to die so my money is with them and my benifishery gets nothing, I should have just opened a savings account somewhere instead of having it returned to standard life totally fed up with them!

I took out a pension plan some time in the 1980's before online technology , all my correspondence since then has been via post.
I recently tried to set up an online account which failed , I phoned the next day and answered all questions relating to account set up and got a link to my mobile phone , I tried to register but the computer said "no" .
I looked on trustpilot and was shocked to see so many one star complaints and decided I was going to have to fight to get my money back off them.
I rang the next day and a new link was sent which worked and I successfully open an online account.
I was told that the app would enable me to drawdown my 25% tax free sum , so I requested the drawdown using the app ( lots of questions ) .
they said they might be writing to me to request additional proof of identity .
they never wrote to me but the drawdown amount was sent to my bank account in under a week , no message that it was being sent , no communication at all , as it seems the way these days .
I was expecting ten rounds of fighting and frustration as previous pension companies have gone out of their way to make the process difficult.
so in this case we'll done standard life .

Just transferred from phoenix to standard life, the process was smooth and straightforward, setting up an online account was easy and the online account is clear and easy to navigate

I was informed my transfer could take up to 4 weeks but it was completed without any issues in just a few days.

Superb service adding other pensions to my account. Easy to use app clear timely communication and transactions completed swiftly

Smooth and efficient, friendly staff all completed on a phone call.