I find myself writing about the same subject, twice in one morning. It’s because I have at last got headlines that match what is happening to my job!

First there’s financial advice. It’s something I did between 1984 and 2005 (the first and  last year I gave advice).

From 2009 to today I have been writing blogs and take seriously those like Naomi who gather information and feed it back to financial services people.

Here is Naomi Rovnik talking to those who follow her on Linked in

And over the last ten years I have been watching and occasionally trying to intervene in the delivery of information about retirement income that I and millions like me have put by for the last 30 or so years of our lives. My leader in thinking on this for most of that time is Richard Smith.

Richard’s question is again obvious and brings all the other questions that I find being asked together

How can any trustee, of any scheme, claim to have been acting in the best interests of members unless they’ve heard from a lot of them?

Knowing what people want is about listening to them. Recently Kim Gubler told the VFM podcast that VFM from pensions was what people wanted satisfying.  Pension VFM is satisfying whatever people want from their pensions.

Knowing the job is getting done is about trusting value for money

• That people are expected to trust a computer rather than a financial adviser at Quilter or St James’ Place.
• Knowing that the post you read digitally and not in the Guardian is accurate.
• Understanding what your pension trustee is doing for you is in your best interest

We have no way to know who is right other than our judgement and we now have new ways to trust each other , through data of the many. This data can easily be corrupted, deliberately (fraud) or because the weight of the masses can crush you human spirit even when you know you’re right.

Here I think that spirituality plays a part. Our human spirit and the spirit of others over time leads to a morality that guides us. It’s a matter of judgement – but it’s very much our guide when faced by artificial intelligence!