Nearly one-fourth (22%) of retirement plan participants said they had no interaction with their provider during the past 12 months. J.D. Power said that was a problem for providers because frequent interaction is directly related to participant satisfaction.
Overall satisfaction scores increased 44 points on a 1,000-point scale when plan participants said they had one to four interactions per year with their plan provider, J.D. Power found. And satisfaction scores increased by as much as 99 points when participants engaged 21 or more times per year with their retirement plan provider.
J.D. Power also found that since investor satisfaction was linked to roll-in and rollover retention, increased levels of unemployment and employment turnover has led to a surge in participant decisions since the outbreak of the epidemic.
Among participants who said they were “delighted” with their retirement plan provider, 51% said they “definitely will” retain assets in their current plan. That percentage fell to just 12% when participants said they were “indifferent” about their plan, and to 7% among those who said they were “dissatisfied” with it.
J.D. Power said that personalized digital communication can help reverse plan participant disaffection, but that few plans offered it. For example, J.D. Powers said, communication satisfaction scores were 70 points higher when participants received personal communications via their retirement plan provider’s mobile app, instead of a traditional email. However, just 15% of retirement plan participants said they had received this type of digital communication.