Benefits Guru Financial Wellness Ratings 2026

Aviva among the providers leading the field with Gold ratings across both rating sets

We are proud to acknowledge Aviva for their outstanding performance in the Benefits Guru Financial Wellness, with and without Open Finance Ratings 2026.

Achieving overall Gold’ awards across their Designer, My Money, and Master Trust propositions, Aviva has demonstrated a strong commitment to delivering high-quality pension financial wellness solutions, digital innovation, and member-focused services. Their excellence across all categories places them among the top-tier providers driving member focused financial wellness and resilience programmes. 

 

Open Banking:

Aviva integrates Open Banking via a partnership with Bud, at no additional cost to members. It supports bank accounts, savings accounts, credit cards, joint accounts, with no limit on connected accounts and 12+ months of transaction history. It connects to 25+ UK providers (including major banks and digital providers) plus Australian accounts. Transactions are automatically categorised across unlimited spending categories, with re-categorisation and search functionality.

Open Banking data drives personalised nudges on spending, saving, and debt management via push notifications and secure messages.

Vulnerable Customers:

Aviva has a dedicated process and team to identify vulnerable customers, aligned with the FCA’s guidance and Consumer Duty regulations. Frontline staff receive annual mandatory training (via a combination of face-to-face, online, and written methods) supported by a network of over 200 Vulnerability Practitioners.

The system uses ‘Additional Needs’ and ‘Vulnerability’ flags to ensure consistent support, supplemented by voice analytics to detect indicators such as low financial resilience. Aviva partners with charities including Macmillan, Citizens Advice, and Money Advice Trust, and offers a toolkit with dedicated web pages, expert videos, and signposting to over 30 support services.

Blended & Guided Retirement Solutions:

Aviva My Money and Master Trust offer a guided blended retirement solution targeting mass-market non-advised members, combining flexible drawdown and guaranteed annuity elements within a pot-based structure accessible seamlessly within the existing workplace pension. It includes a discretionary spending fund, default de-risking glidepath, income sustainability warnings, automated retirement income modelling, longevity risk management, and scenario modelling tools. Members can adjust income via the support team, and the journey features save-and-return functionality, simplified non-technical language, video educational content, and external signposting for additional support.

Aviva’s solution is continuously developed to enhance the customer journey, with ongoing improvements to digital functionality and online member support.

Chatbots & Virtual Assistants:

Aviva provides a member-facing chatbot based on simple scripted algorithms. The chatbot can answer account-specific queries (e.g., current pot value), respond to financial wellness questions (e.g., retirement savings adequacy), and provide general financial wellness help. It also supports seamless escalation by connecting members to a human agent within the same chat window for additional support.

Financial Education (personalised content):

Aviva delivers personalised financial education through multiple channels: online resources (guides, case studies, third-party links), face-to-face sessions (in person or screenshare), mobile app, and video content. Content can be white-labelled to match employer branding, and bespoke employer-provided material can be incorporated.

Topics span workplace pensions, state pension, retirement options, investments, death benefits, debt management, budgeting, savings, credit, and wills, with links to key bodies including Pension Wise, MAS, and TPR.

 

Financial Health Check:

Aviva provides a Financial Health Check accessible via portal and app. It considers pension, ISA, investment and cash holdings, income, expenditure, secured and unsecured debt, and emergency funds — with data input manually. The check reviews spending and saving habits, debt levels, predicted state pension, financial goals, and retirement planning. Users receive a scored assessment with benchmarks and breakdowns by area, along with suggested actions. Educational support is provided via third-party links and own literature, with access to a financial or debt adviser and signposting to the Money Advice Service.

Aviva’s new financial wellbeing tool will be available to member’s on the Unisure platform later in 2026.

Financial Resilience:

Aviva provides a range of tools to help members understand their financial position. These tools bring together pension, ISA, investment and cash holdings, income, expenditure, and secured and unsecured debt, using a combination of member‑provided information and, where enabled, Open Banking data. Depending on the tool used, members may receive a financial wellbeing or health score generated using different data inputs and methodologies. These tools are accessible via the portal and app.

Members can access financial coaching (face‑to‑face, online, chatbot, or messaging) from both FCA‑regulated advisers and guidance specialists, including support for partners or spouses. Contribution adjustments and hardship guidance are available through all channels, supported by behavioural science techniques and tools designed to help members navigate major life events.

 

Life Events and Goal Based Planning:

Aviva offers guided journeys tailored to key life moments including buying a first home, having a child, planning for redundancy, and later life care. Journeys combine curated articles, interactive calculators/modelling tools, and product recommendations.

The system proactively suggests relevant journeys based on member data. Members can set, name, and track multiple financial goals simultaneously, model “what-if” scenarios, and include a partner’s financial information. Personalised nudges alert members on progress, with prompts to allocate bonuses towards goals. Educational content is tagged to life stage and financial goals.

Non pension savings vehicles:

Aviva offers its own Cash ISA, Stocks & Shares ISA, and General Investment Account (GIA) products, plus a Junior ISA provided via Wealthify (Aviva-owned). Members can make one-off payments via app/portal, bank transfer, or direct contact. ISA transfers are accepted (automated for S&S ISA, manual for others).

The GIA includes a contribution holiday option. Employer contributions are supported on some products. Advanced savings methods (rounding up, algorithm-based savings, sweeping) are not currently available.

Our annual ratings are designed to assist advisers, providers and employers in their decision-making process and highlight which providers have the greatest strengths in different areas of their pension propositions.

To view the full medals tables, all the awards and the accompanying provider factsheets please visit www.benefitsguru.co.uk/ratings/