Standard Life, the UK insurer, has cut 400 roles during the first half of the year, despite a 73% increase in profits to £461m in the six months to the end of June.
The jobs form part of a plan, announced in March, to axe 1,000 roles to save £180m by the end of the year, and an additional £100m a year by 2009.
The pensions specialist, which has a 10,000-strong workforce, has already cut 4,500 jobs since 2004.
The group has invested heavily in self-invested personal pensions (Sipp), which generate more profits than standard pensions.
It said in a statement: “In March, we announced our aim to reduce underlying costs by a further £100m by 2009, in addition to existing initiatives announced at the time of the IPO [initial public offering] to reduce UK life and pensions and corporate costs by the end of 2007.
“At 30 June 2007, group headcount was 10,472, a reduction of 269 from 31 December 2006, after creating 147 additional jobs from the investment in UK Sipp and Wrap [an online administrative system where the provider holds and sometimes manages a client’s investment].”
A spokesman for Standard Life told Personnel Today: “We aim to keep redundancies down to a minimum, and any reductions that have already taken place are as a result of normal staff turnover rather than compulsory redundancies.
