Citizens Advice has welcomed the Government’s announcement that they will ban cold calls about pensions in order to help protect people from being targeted by pension scammers.

The charity had recommended this action as part of its work on pensions.

Gillian Guy, Chief Executive of Citizens Advice, said:

“Cold calling is a favoured tactic of fraudsters targeting people’s retirement savings.

“Citizens Advice found that as many as 10.9 million people received unsolicited calls, emails and texts about their pensions over the last year. Promises of high returns are used to trick people into fake investments leaving them with a reduced or even empty pension pot.

“The government’s ban on pension cold calls is the right move to protect people. The power to fine scammers also means enforcement bodies will be able to put a stop to any scammers that still target people’s savings.”