The average value of women’s pension contributions was 28 per cent lower than for men, despite an increase in the value of women's pension contributions over the past six years, research from PensionBee has revealed.

The research, which looked at the frequency and values of pension contributions over the period 2017 to 2022 for PensionBee customers, revealed that the average value of the pension contributions made by men was £2,513 a year, 28 per cent more than those contributions made by women (£1,890 a year).

This is despite the average value per contribution increased by 11 per cent for women over the past six years whist, at the same time, decreasing by 21 per cent for men.

PensionBee’s research also found a disparity in the frequency of pension contributions, reporting that the average number of pension contributions for men was 0.2 per quarter higher than women.

The research detailed that men made an average of 3.1 pension contributions per quarter whilst women made an average of 2.9.

It was additionally revealed that the average number of contributions per quarter had increased by a higher proportion in the past three years for men compared to women, increasing by 0.5 for men (from 2.6 to 3.1) and 0.2 for women (from 2.7 to 2.9) which, according to PensionBee, indicates that the pandemic “boosted men’s pension saving efforts more than it did for women”.

PensionBee director of public affairs, Becky O’Connor, commented: “There are green shoots of evidence that the gender pension gap could close, according to PensionBee male and female customer data.

“It’s great to see the effort our female customers are making towards boosting their pensions and while the value of contributions is still lower than for male customers, the trajectory is going in the right direction.”

O’Connor additionally stated that men seem to be making more frequent contributions, while women make slightly fewer, but are increasing the amount they put in each time, on average.

“There is still a huge amount to do on the gender pension gap: paying female workers equally is an obvious one but redressing the imbalance in society around who does caring is another big one to tackle,” she continued.

“From our data, it appears female customers are doing as much as they can possibly manage that is within their own control to look after their own futures, but against the wider odds, individual efforts only go so far.”

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