The UK pension industry has a persistent member engagement problem. The majority of inbound contact centre queries are routine — pot balance, contribution rate, retirement date, beneficiaries — yet each one costs £8–12 per call, takes 8–12 minutes on hold, and occupies specialist time that would be better directed at complex casework. Existing approaches compound the problem rather than solving it. Legacy member portals are difficult to navigate. Generic AI chatbots hallucinate and disconnect from real member data. Paper communications achieve single-digit response rates.
Governed AI · Fintech
MemberBridge
AI-powered member engagement for UK pension schemes.
A secure orchestration platform that gives pension scheme members instant, personalised answers to their questions — embedded directly inside their existing member portal. Built for the regulatory demands of UK pension administration: governed response templates, a complete audit trail, and a PII trust boundary that keeps member data inside the client's environment.
< 3s
Response time
2 weeks
Time to go-live
70%
Potential query deflection
£2.1M
Annual saving (100k members)
The Problem
Routine queries are crippling pension contact centres.
Key challenges
- Each routine call costs £8–12 and occupies 8–12 minutes of specialist time
- Generic chatbots hallucinate answers disconnected from the member's actual record
- The Pensions Regulator and FCA have increased focus on member outcomes and value for money
- Pension dashboards rollout will generate a surge of member queries that legacy infrastructure cannot handle
What We Built
A governed AI layer embedded in the member portal.
MemberBridge is a secure orchestration layer that sits between a pension scheme's member portal and its administration data. A member types a question in plain English. The platform classifies the intent, securely retrieves the relevant data from the provider's systems via an HMAC-authenticated client gateway, and composes a personalised response using approved templates — all within three seconds. The platform is embedded via a single script tag into any existing portal. It carries the scheme's branding. The scheme's administrators retain full control through a dedicated admin panel: they define what the assistant can and cannot address, review every response template, and access a complete audit trail.
Capabilities
What the platform does
Personalised by default
Every response draws on the member's live record — pot value, contribution rate, retirement date, fund holdings, and dependants. Members receive answers specific to their situation, not generic estimates from static FAQs.
Governed by the scheme
Administrators manage intents, response templates, escalation rules, and knowledge documents through a dedicated admin panel. Nothing is said to a member without prior approval. The workflow builder lets administrators configure new intents without a development deployment.
Secure by design
Personally identifiable information is masked before it leaves the client's environment. Member data is never used to train AI models. The platform is aligned to ISO 27001 and designed for UK GDPR compliance and FCA-regulated environments.
Pre-built and fast to deploy
MemberBridge ships with a library of production-tested intent bundles covering the queries members ask most frequently. An automated end-to-end test suite validates every intent against live member data before go-live. Typical time from contract to live: two weeks.
Escalation built in
When a query falls outside the configured scope, the platform routes the member to the appropriate specialist. Escalation paths are configurable per intent and maintain a warm handoff rather than a dead end.
Full audit trail
Every interaction — question asked, data accessed, response given — is logged with a timestamp and available for compliance review at any time. The superadmin panel provides cross-tenant visibility for platform operators.
Technical Architecture
Key decisions and why
01
Widget delivered as a Shadow DOM web component
The member-facing chat widget is built as a self-contained custom element with full CSS isolation via Shadow DOM. It embeds via a single script tag and custom HTML element with no style conflicts, no framework dependencies, and no changes required to the host portal. A legacy window.PensionWidget.init() API provides backward compatibility for older portals.
02
YAML-defined workflow engine for intent execution
Each member intent is backed by a YAML-defined workflow that sequences HTTP calls to provider APIs, data mapping steps, conditional branching, and template rendering. This separates business logic from code — administrators install and configure new intents without a development deployment, and workflows can be upgraded or rolled back independently per tenant.
03
PII trust boundary via HMAC-authenticated client gateway
The client gateway — a deployable Express.js service that pension providers run inside their own infrastructure — handles live member data. MemberBridge calls the gateway over HMAC-SHA256 authenticated requests. Raw member PII is retrieved, used to compose a response, and never persisted in the MemberBridge environment. This design satisfies the data residency requirements of regulated UK pension schemes.
04
Multi-tenant data isolation at the data access layer
Every database table carries a tenantId column. All queries are scoped at the data access layer rather than relying on application-level filtering. A superadmin role provides cross-tenant visibility for platform operators without requiring separate credentials per tenant.
Technology
Stack
Platform API
Next.js 15TypeScriptPostgreSQLPrisma ORM
Auth & Security
JWT (jose)httpOnly cookiesRBACHMAC-SHA256
AI & Workflow
LLM intent classificationGoverned response templatesYAML workflow engine
Member Widget
Vite IIFE buildShadow DOMWeb Components API
Integration
Express.js client gatewayREST provider adaptersVite React demo portal
Admin Tooling
Next.js 15 admin panelReact 19Visual workflow builderIntegration test runner
Results
Outcomes
- 01
A fully deployable, multi-tenant SaaS platform ready for commercial pilots with UK pension schemes
- 02
Single-line-of-code embed capability — no changes required to the host member portal
- 03
Two-week go-live enabled by pre-built intent bundles and automated integration testing
- 04
Security architecture designed for the regulatory requirements of FCA-regulated environments
- 05
70% potential deflection of routine queries — £2.1M annual savings for a 100,000-member scheme
- 06
Public website, pricing model, and sales infrastructure ready to support client acquisition
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