This article was originally published in the print edition of Retirement Magazine Vol. 3

In October 2025, Chant West and the Epic Retirement Institute released the list of six super funds that were awarded the inaugural Epic Retirement Tick. In the weeks following this announcement, Chant West met with all funds that met our initial screening criteria (more than 20 funds) and for which we conducted a full assessment for the Tick, to discuss why they did or did not get the Tick. 

The funds that didn’t make it in 2025 were keen to understand what they need to do in 2026 and beyond to make the grade. Many of these funds recognised they could be doing more for their members in retirement, and we expect loads more retirement-focused services and products from these funds in the next year or so. We were also encouraged to hear the plans of the six funds that received the Tick to further develop their offer to help members convert their super into retirement income – which is of course the point of the whole system.

While we were pretty happy with the initial 18 criteria we used in 2025, we always knew they could be improved. So we used the meetings with each fund and further conversations with many in the super industry to put together our 2026 criteria – and there are now 20. 

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How are the 2026 criteria different?

For 2026, we have provided more structure to the set of criteria, separating them into the following three areas – Product Design & Investments; Education, Guidance & Advice; and Service Delivery – in recognition of the importance of each of these areas. While high quality products, appropriate features and strong investments are critical to deliver strong retirement outcomes, funds also must provide education, guidance and advice to help members know how to use these products effectively. And then service delivery is critical to ensure members can easily join, manage and change how they use these products, and to get the most out of them.

When we turn to the individual criteria, we actually added five new criteria for 2026 and removed three criteria. Let’s talk about the removals first, as they are all fairly simple. 

First of all, we removed the intra-fund advice criteria covering single advice issues as more advice is generally needed by members around retirement. We also removed one of the performance criteria so that we now just look at the performance of the 70/30 option in pension. 

And finally, we ended up blending in digital advice with the two simple retirement planning criteria, recognising that digital advice is just another way of providing the simple advice that members need.

What are the new criteria? Well three of the new criteria actually relate to service delivery as we wanted to beef up this section. We added one criteria that assesses whether members can do important pension-related actions online – like joining the pension division, commuting and starting a new pension and non-lapsing binding nominations. We also added a criteria on complaints – looking at the level of complaints, how efficiently they are resolved and what resources are available to resolve them. And we also added a criteria on cyber security and fraud prevention for which we have been assisted by a cyber consultancy – this one probably needs a bit more explanation. 

Firstly, we are looking for funds that require multi-factor authentication on not just member login, but also for high-risk transactions. We also want funds to offer a secure online way for members to provide identification which is necessary around retirement when money can now be paid out. We also want to see that funds have strong cyber security protections and have external certification to demonstrate that. Funds may well have strong cyber practices but just like financial statements are certified by external audit, we believe cyber risks should be assessed with a comprehensive external certification – this provides us, as well as regulators and members, with confidence that cyber risks are being handled appropriately.

We also added a couple of new criteria under Product Design & Investments. Firstly, we added a criteria that looks at the education, guidance and advice services provided to members to help them consider whether a lifetime product might be right for them and, if so, how best to use it. It is critical to provide such services to members approaching retirement, otherwise very few retiring members would take up a lifetime product, even though it may be ideally suited to their situation. Any education and guidance on lifetime products needs to be done in an engaging way and any advice must be low-cost. This criteria may also look at where an external lifetime product is often considered by a fund’s internal advisers when advising for their clients, and is sometimes taken up. 

Reflecting best practice

The other new criteria in this section reflects one of the Treasury Best Practice Principles: that different retirement cohorts need to be presented with differentiated product and service offerings. Our criteria requires that different solutions (which could be product and/or services) are offered to members based on their retirement cohort or maybe even based on their individual circumstances. We expect to see a lot of development in this space in coming years as funds get better at recognising what solutions are appropriate for which members. 

We also made some other changes to existing criteria as follows:

• The investment portfolio “ideally suited to pension members” now must be a diversified option
• The one remaining performance criteria for the 70/30 option is now assessed over seven years rather than 10 years
• In addition to offering a lifetime product, we want to see some take-up of the product by members

Our two simple retirement planning criteria now cover advice delivered by humans, digitally or hybrid, but also explicitly require that these services include advice on recommended investments, annual drawdown and estimated age pension, with clear instructions on implementation (and we have increased the threshold for household advice to $2000)

Our assessment of each fund’s comprehensive advice offering will be based on whichever advice offering is used the most – either advice provided through internal advisers or external advisers

Our Tools & Calculators criteria now requires that the retirement income calculator’s functionality is at least as good as MoneySmart, and we also assess whether a member has access to an online tool to show current age pension eligibility and entitlements, either on the fund website or through a prominent link to an external tool

We have also included in the retirement nudges criteria whether a fund is nudging those over age 65 with only a super account to consider whether they should transfer to pension

What do funds need to get the Epic Retirement Tick?

In order to be awarded the Tick, funds will need to meet 14 of the 20 criteria, plus also meet one final overarching criteria: that there is no current Enforceable Undertaking or additional licence condition, unless an appropriate independent party has confirmed the relevant conditions have now been met. 

This overarching criteria recognises that such regulator-imposed conditions reflect that some changes need to be made in these funds. But we also don’t need to wait for APRA’s removal of additional licence conditions as these may not always be announced publicly, and if a fund has genuinely made the required changes as confirmed by an appropriate independent party, then they should no longer be excluded.

We are looking forward to assessing funds in September and we anticipate seeing lots of initiatives funds have introduced that may help funds get the Tick but, most of all, will mean these funds are providing more of what members need, both leading into and in retirement.

Ian Fryer is general manager of Chant West and a member of The Conexus Institute advisory board. He has worked in the superannuation industry for about 25 years, including more than 16 years at Chant West. He holds a Bachelor of Science (Hons) from the University of Sydney, a Master of International Relations from Macquarie University and a Master of Arts (Theology) from the Australian College of Theology. He is a qualified actuary (AIAA).

The Conexus Institute is a not-for-profit think-tank philanthropically funded by Conexus Financial, publisher of Retirement Magazine.