If you’re someone who brings strong vendor management expertise, commercial acumen, and a focus on delivering high-quality customer outcomes, our Annuities Operations team would love to meet you.
Job Type: Permanent
Location: This role could be based in either our Edinburgh or London offices with time spent working from home and from the office.
Flexible working: All roles are open to part-time, job-share and other types of flexibility. We will discuss what is important to you and balancing this with business requirements during the recruitment process. You can read more about flexible working here.
Salary and benefits: From £70k depending on experience plus bonus, private medical cover, 38 days annual leave, excellent pension, 12x salary life assurance, career breaks, income protection, 3x volunteering days and much more.
Who are we?
We’re Standard Life, a retirement specialist focused entirely on retirement savings and income. We champion the belief that everyone’s journey to and through retirement can be better, and for more than 200 years, we’ve been helping our customers plan and prepare for their financial futures.
Life today is increasingly complicated, uncertain and unpredictable. People move through different careers, face unexpected moments and navigate important choices. We offer our colleagues flexibility, trust and benefits that work for whatever life brings. In return we expect curiosity, connection, accountability and high standards. We make room for what matters - so you can bring your best, every day.
The role
The TPA Manager – Annuities is responsible for the strategic oversight and end-to-end management of outsourced administration partners across both Bulk Purchase Annuity (BPA) and Individual Annuities.
The role acts as the primary owner of TPA relationships, ensuring that all third-party administrators deliver high-quality, compliant, and cost-effective services aligned to contractual obligations and customer experience expectations.
This includes accountability for service performance, commercial outcomes, operational delivery, and risk management, as well as driving continuous improvement and innovation across the outsourced operating model.
Key Responsibilities
Lead and manage strategic relationships with outsourced TPAs, acting as the senior point of contact and shaping partnership strategy aligned to business objectives.
Oversee TPA performance and service delivery, ensuring SLAs, KPIs and contractual obligations are met, with clear governance, service reviews and remediation where required.
Own commercial and contract oversight, including pricing, renewals and cost management, driving value for money and identifying optimisation opportunities.
Ensure effective operational integration, supporting scheme onboarding, aligning outsourced delivery with internal teams, and enabling readiness for new business.
Maintain robust risk, governance and regulatory compliance, overseeing third-party risk, audits, and mitigating operational and data risks.
Drive customer outcomes and continuous improvement, enhancing end-to-end member and trustee experience, embedding best practice, and identifying automation and transformation opportunities.
Influence and engage senior stakeholders, providing MI, building strong cross-functional relationships, and representing the organisation in external forums.
What are we looking for?
Experience in TPA/vendor management within financial services.
Strong understanding of BPA, annuities and DB pensions.
Experience managing third-party relationships and performance.
Strong commercial and contract management skills.
Knowledge of risk, compliance and governance frameworks.
Excellent stakeholder management and influencing skills.
We want to hire the whole version of you.
We are committed to ensuring that everyone feels accepted and welcome applicants from all backgrounds. If your experience looks different from what we’ve advertised and you believe that you can bring value to the role, we’d love to hear from you.
If you require any adjustments to the recruitment process, please let us know so we can help you to be at your best.
We’re reviewing applications as they come in, so apply early to avoid missing out.
Find out more about working at Standard Life
- Guide for Candidates: standardlifeplc.pagetiger.com/guideforcandidates
- Find or get answers from our colleagues: www.standardlifeplc.com/careers/talk-to-us
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Skills Required
- Experience in third-party administrator or vendor management within financial services
- Strong understanding of bulk purchase annuities, annuities, and defined benefit pensions
- Experience managing third-party relationships and performance
- Strong commercial and contract management skills
- Knowledge of risk, compliance, and governance frameworks
- Excellent stakeholder management and influencing skills
What We Do
Standard Life champions the belief that everyone’s journey to and through retirement can be better, using our size, expertise and influence - to shape the world our customers will retire into.
