latform giants Hargreaves Lansdown and Aegon are among 67 firms to join an initiative calling for greater standards in pension switching.

The partnership between Criterion and TeX, under the brand of Star, is working on a transfers & re-registration initiative which it hopes will shape “recognised, industry-wide standards to promote good practice in transfers”.

Fidelity and Standard Life have also petitioned their fund groups to support the campaign.

Andrew Marker, chairman of the Star steering group and head of retail pension at Vanguard Asset Management Limited, said the initiative would improve customer outcomes and make participating companies more efficient. It could even become part of the due diligence process in the future.

Mr Marker said: “It is too early to build Star membership into fund due diligence processes, but the weight that platforms are putting behind this initiative signposts that they expect support for Star to become a future due diligence requirement.

“Star is a voluntary framework and has achieved rapid legitimacy and momentum, due to the significant organisations participating, representing a cross section of the financial services industry.”

The campaign officially launched in January last year and hopes to “galvanise” the industry by agreeing service levels between platforms, Isa managers, pension companies, asset managers and transfer agents.

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