Secondary annuity market will face "significant challenges"

Separating the owner of the policy from the life insured would mean the life insured no longer has a financial interest in the policy and therefore could be less inclined to notify the insurer of a change in address, tax position or, ultimately, death. If the insured retired overseas this could cause further administrative complications.

In addition, overpayments as a result of a failure to notify the death of the life insured may occur and could be problematic to recover. The issue would be amplified as the policy could be resold many times and the new owner could be based outside the UK.

Equiniti warns a secondary market could also increase risk of fraud or money laundering issues especially where a potential buyer is based outside of the UK.

Paul Sturgess, pensions strategy director, Equiniti said:

“We welcome the delay in the implementation of a secondary annuity market as there are significant challenges that need resolving. Many annuity providers may not have the necessary technical, operational and compliance resources to handle the transitions and, therefore, I would expect that there will be a swing to outsourced administration. There will be a cost associated with these administrative issues which someone will have to bear the cost of – perhaps there might be a need for a standardised legal contract whereby the purchaser is responsible for all future administrative costs.”