The Retirement Savings Depot is set to change private retirement savings in Germany starting in 2027. In addition to traditional guaranteed products, a new, more capital market-oriented product world is emerging.
For banks, insurers, and financial service providers, the new market opens up opportunities. However, a challenge arises that is less visible at first glance:
How can the Retirement Savings Depot be integrated into existing IT landscapes that have developed over decades?
Because behind modern digital application and customer processes often lie core systems that have reliably processed customer, contract, inventory, and transaction data for many years.
These very systems will need to work together with new depot, funding, reporting, and transfer processes in the future.
The Retirement Savings Depot is more than just a new financial product
With the reform of tax-advantaged private retirement savings, new savings options are to be created. This particularly includes the return-oriented Retirement Savings Depot without capital guarantee.
Additionally, a particularly simply designed variant is planned with the Standard Depot Retirement Savings, where many investment decisions are represented through standard settings.
However, for the IT of the providers, the introduction means far more than just providing an additional product.
New and existing systems must connect data and processes for custody management, funding, inventory management, reporting, and provider switching. At the same time, existing funding and reporting processes must be taken into account.
This quickly turns a product innovation into an integration and architecture project.
When new processes meet established core systems
Also the Legacy IT Center is currently dealing with the impacts of the retirement savings account on established IT landscapes.
In the article „Retirement savings account increases pressure on established IT“ scalability, automation, as well as the importance of modern interfaces and integration architectures are discussed.
Particularly relevant is the interplay of different components: securities backend, compliance, digital application processes, inventory management, reporting, and service must communicate with each other.
For banks and insurance companies, the question is therefore less whether existing systems play a role.
What is crucial is:
Which systems are affected – and how can they be quickly and controlled opened for the new product world?
COBOL and mainframe are not automatically the problem
In the discussion about legacy IT, there is quickly the impression that older systems must be completely replaced.
From our perspective, this is too short-sighted.
Many COBOL and mainframe applications have reliably processed business-critical processes and large amounts of data for decades.
The challenge often arises where these systems are not flexible enough to communicate with new applications, platforms, and data architectures.
Therefore, the answer to the retirement savings depot does not automatically have to be a Core Replacement.
Instead, the following should first be examined:
- Which existing systems and COBOL applications are needed for the retirement savings depot?
- What customer, contract, inventory, and transaction data is available there?
- Which processes need to be adjusted or expanded?
- What interfaces to new depot or platform solutions are missing?
- What data and functions can be made available through modern APIs?
- Where is targeted modernization sensible?
- Which existing systems can continue to operate unchanged?
Modernization does not necessarily mean replacement.
Often, a controlled integration of existing core systems is the faster and lower-risk path.
APIs and integration become the crucial link.
New digital products rarely emerge today within a single system.
Frontend, depot platform, securities settlement, compliance, reporting, CRM, and existing core systems must exchange data and processes with each other.
Thus, APIs and modern integration architectures also gain importance in the retirement savings depot.
They can create a controlled connection between existing legacy systems and new digital solutions.
This creates an additional advantage for companies:
Such an integration architecture not only addresses requirements related to the retirement savings depot.
It can simultaneously create the foundation to make existing core systems more accessible for future digital and regulatory requirements.
2027 sounds far away – but for IT, it is not.
The new retirement savings products are to be offered starting January 1, 2027.
For the technical implementation, this means: Preparation must begin significantly earlier.
Before new products can be offered productively, dependencies must be understood, data identified, interfaces designed, existing processes adjusted, and new components integrated and tested.
Especially in complex legacy landscapes, sufficient lead time is crucial.
The central question is therefore already today:
Is our existing IT landscape technically prepared to implement the retirement savings depot 2027?
From regulatory project to sustainable modernization.
The retirement savings depot can also be a meaningful reason to fundamentally review existing IT architectures.
Because many of the questions that arise now are not specific to this one product:
How do we make data from existing core systems available?
How do we reduce technical dependencies?
How do we create standardized interfaces?
How do we integrate new applications faster?
And how do we modernize step by step without jeopardizing functioning core processes?
Whoever answers these questions in a structured manner within the framework of the retirement savings depot may also create the technical foundation for further requirements – from Open Finance and FiDA to new digital business models.
Retirement Savings Depot Readiness Check by RetroCode
RetroCode supports banks, insurance companies, and financial service providers in analyzing the impact of the retirement savings depot on existing COBOL, mainframe, and legacy landscapes.
With our Retirement Savings Depot Readiness Check we consider five key areas:
1. Legacy & COBOL Impact Analysis
Which existing applications, programs, and components are affected?
2. Data & Process Analysis
What data and processes are needed for the new product world, and in which systems are they currently located?
3. Interfaces & Integration
How can existing systems be connected to new applications, depot solutions, and platforms?
4. Need for Modernization
Which applications can continue to operate – and where are adjustments, integration, or modernization sensible?
5. Implementation Roadmap
Which technical measures should be prioritized to prepare the existing IT landscape for the retirement savings depot?
The result: a concrete technical roadmap for the implementation of the retirement savings depot in your existing IT landscape.
Is your legacy IT ready for the retirement savings depot 2027?
The introduction of the retirement savings depot is not just a product or regulatory task.
It is also an integration and architecture task.
Companies that understand early which existing systems, data, and processes are affected can reduce technical risks and plan the implementation more effectively.
RetroCode combines COBOL and mainframe expertise with modern integration and modernization approaches – ensuring that proven core systems remain usable for the next generation of digital financial products.
Learn more: Retirement Savings Depot Readiness Check