Retiring workers are being “ripped off” by financial companies making huge profit margins on annuities, campaigners have warned.

A Telegraph investigation has raised concerns about the profits that insurance companies and other firms are making on annuities. Only one annuities provider, Standard Life, has disclosed its margins on annuities, revealing that it pockets almost 20p of every pound a customer pays for an annuity. Other firms refuse to reveal their margins, and experts warn that the industry is concealing large profits. Ros Altmann, a pensions campaigner, said: “These huge margins are outrageous.” Annuities rates have tumbled in recent years as the Bank of England’s quantitative easing programme pushes down returns on the government bonds that are the basis of annuity income.....Read more here