Get familiar with super apps or you could be losing money, says Australian Retirement Trust

Australians are missing out on hundreds of thousands of dollars in superannuation returns and being charged unnecessary fees because they fail to check their super apps, according to one of the nation’s largest super funds.

About 77 per cent of the nation does not check a super app regularly while 28 per cent are yet to download it, according to a YouGov survey. The Australian Retirement Trust believes the failure to embrace super apps is leading to a lack of financial literacy.

Those figures break down even further across genders; with one third of women are yet to download their super app compared with 24 per cent of men, while 17 per cent of women use their super app once a month compared with 27 per cent of men.

ART’s Anne Fuchs told The Australian that the superannuation fund was “desperate” to get more women using the app regularly and taking better care of what is for most people their largest financial asset.

“For some reason they are really not keeping up with their male counterparts and we are just desperate to get women to awaken to their own financial assets,” she said.

“It will probably be their largest financial asset in their life and they’re going to need to depend on it so that they don’t have to depend on anyone.”

Ms Fuchs said the breakdown was disheartening, particularly as older women in Australia were the fastest group becoming homeless. She encouraged young women seeking financial independence to be more active with their super.

“For all those young women that are about empowerment and all those things, they should be looking at this as another way of creating control of their future self and independence,” she said.

If Australians were more familiar with their super fund’s investment strategies, they could opt into different investments whereby a 1 per cent higher return could result in more than $250,000 of difference, the fund said.

Australian Retirement Trust executive general manager of advocacy and impact Anne Fuchs. Picture: The Photo Pitch

Less than 2 per cent of ART’s members under the age of 40 were making voluntary contributions to their super compared with 20 per cent of members over the age of 40.

“Young people put on sunscreen because they don’t want to look old and haggard with skin cancer even though it’s 40 years away,” she said.

“It’s the same analogy; you’ve got to download the app, check in and make some additional contributions and make sure you’ve got the right amount of insurance so that you’re not financially haggard at the end of your working life.”

Some research claims that Australians should have about $66,500 in super by age 30 and $168,000 by 40. Ms Fuchs said she believed the number of younger members contributing to their super would increase dramatically if more checked their app regularly.

Australians should be checking their superannuation app as regularly as their banking apps – which according to the same research were checked once or twice a month by 80 per cent of people.

The research, undertaken by YouGov on behalf of ART, surveyed 1002 Australians in October last year.

ART wants its members and other Australians to check their super accounts each time they’re paid, to ensure their employers are paying the right amount of super and on time.

By law, employers who miss payment dates are required to pay the super guarantee charge.

Super payments are required quarterly. However, from July 1, 2026, employers will be required to pay super no later than seven days after an employee has been paid.

Australian Retirement Trust has more than 2.4 million members – about 15 per cent of the working population – with an average balance of $130,000.

“If you had $130,000 in the bank, you’d check it to make sure you’ve not found too much in bank fees and so forth,” Ms Fuchs said.

“So the same principle applies with that balance in your super accounts … it’s to make sure you’re not paying too much in fees, that you’re not over-insured or underinsured and that you’re in the right investment strategy with the fund.”

This article first appeared in The Australian.