Corporate Insight Releases Report on Virtual Assistants in Retirement - Fidelity and Voya Earn Top Marks; Transparency, In-Chat Data and Live Escalation Emerge as Defining Features
New Retirement Plan Monitor Research Reveals Wide Performance Gaps Across Eight Recordkeepers as Participant Demand for AI-Powered Support Grows
NEW YORK, NY, May 27, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Corporate Insight (CI), the leading provider of competitive intelligence and customer experience research to the financial services industry, today announced findings from a Retirement Plan Monitor report examining how virtual assistants are performing across leading recordkeeper platforms. Based on an in-depth evaluation of authenticated web and mobile experiences, the research reveals a fragmented landscape: while adoption is gradually increasing, most virtual assistants fall short of participant expectations for real-time account data, seamless live chat escalation and consistent cross-platform availability.
CI's researchers tested eight virtual assistants across five prompt categories (Account Information, Troubleshooting, Transactions, FAQs and Escalation) evaluating each tool's ability to respond to free-entry queries, recognize typos and casual phrasing, surface participant-specific data in-chat and connect users with live representatives.
"While virtual assistants are an increasingly common feature of participant platforms, the gap in underlying functionality between leaders and the broader field is telling," says Andrew Denegre, senior analyst at CI. "The firms earning top marks are moving beyond troubleshooting and navigation to deliver validated account data and transactional capabilities. These providers are laying the groundwork to potentially evolve chat from a tertiary support channel to a secondary, conversational interface—a shift that seems increasingly less radical given consumer adoption of LLMs.”
The report evaluates the virtual assistants from eight firms (Alight, Empower, Fidelity, Merrill, Nationwide, TIAA, Vanguard and Voya Financial) and assigns grades of Excellent, Good, Fair or Poor based on in-chat capabilities, natural language recognition, account data delivery and escalation design.
Key findings reveal a wide performance spectrum and persistent gaps across the coverage set:
Fidelity and Voya Financial earn Excellent ratings for cross-platform strength and transactional depth: Fidelity's NetBenefits Virtual Assistant stands out for its polished interface, strong natural language processing and unique use of the VA as a proactive notification channel, alerting participants to pending tasks such as beneficiary reminders. Voya PAL offers the strongest array of in-chat account details, including contribution, balance, activity and distribution data, as well as direct access to a real person via live chat.
Firms lean into AI-first branding over human personas: The report also found a new wave of AI-first branding among VAs, with firms rolling back human-personas in favor of clearer identification of their AI-powered assistants. Alight renamed its Ask Lisa tool to Intelligent Virtual Assistant, and TIAA’s Mr. Carnegie became TIAA gAlt. CI's AI in Financial Services survey previously found that 58% of respondents abandoned a chat upon realizing they were talking to AI rather than a human representative.
In-chat data delivery remains the most consequential gap: The majority of virtual assistants in this report default to redirect links rather than surfacing account-specific information within the chat interface. Only a handful of tools—including Voya PAL, Fidelity's NetBenefits VA and Alight's IVA—deliver balance, contribution rate or related account details directly in-chat, a capability that directly shapes whether participants view the tool as genuinely useful.
“The best virtual assistants in this space combine strong automated support across app and web with reliable, easily findable paths to a human representative” adds Denegre. “For most participants, virtual assistants’ real value isn’t as a self-contained FAQ library, it’s as a low-friction conduit to the right kind of help via the right channel. That makes integration with conventional support systems and cross-platform parity vital to a strong user experience.”
The report identifies near-term priorities for recordkeepers, including delivering account-specific data directly within the VA interface, ensuring escalation pathways to live chat are accessible from any point in the conversation and extending virtual assistant availability to mobile platforms.
Access the Report
Organizations can contact CI to learn how to access the full Virtual Assistants report. Media seeking key findings and analyst perspectives can contact CI's press team to learn more.
About Corporate Insight
Corporate Insight (CI) delivers competitive intelligence, user experience research and consulting services to the nation's leading financial services, insurance and healthcare organizations. As the recognized industry leader in customer experience research for over 30 years, CI offers a best-in-class research platform and a unique approach of analyzing the actual customer experience to help organizations advance their competitive position in the marketplace.
About Retirement Plan Monitor
CI's Retirement Plan Monitor is a subscription-based competitive intelligence research service focused on the digital retirement plan participant experience. The service provides subscribers with first-hand insights into the authenticated platform experiences of leading recordkeepers, delivering competitive analysis reports, monthly updates and capability tracking to help subscribers identify emerging trends and maintain a competitive edge.
Patrick Flood Corporate Insight 646-876-7535 media@corporateinsight.com
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