Pensions funds come in all shapes and sizes. We welcome entries from all types of pensions structures and arrangements from across Europe,​ including cash, defined benefit, defined contribution and hybrid plans, irrespective of size and the regulatory environments in which they operate. These may include:    

• Corporate pension funds and group retirement plans   
• French and Swiss Caisses de Retraite
• Italian Casse de Previdenza
• Industry-wide multi-employer pension funds
• Life insurance and pensions insurance companies
• Professional multi-employer pension funds
• Public sector pension funds
• Sovereign reserve and buffer funds
• National first pillar and pay-as-you-go pension funds

Comprising chiefly investment consultants, academics and former pension fund executives from across Europe, the IPE European Pension Fund Awards judges are specially chosen according to their region and/or area of expertise. Up to 100 judges participate in the IPE European Pension Fund Awards judging roster.

The judges make use of IPE's online entry system to review and score the entries. Each judging panel features at least four judges. The recipients of the Outstanding Industry Contribution and Pension Fund Leader/Team of the Year are based on Editor's Choice. 

Judging involves a two-stage review process:

1. The first phase of the judging process invites members of each judging panel to read and score the entries according to a 20-point score matrix that ranks each against its peers, nationally, regionally and globally. We calculate an average of the judges’ scores to produce the result in each category.
2. The second phase involves the Chair of judges working closely with IPE to review each result. For close results within a 0.5 differential, we revert to the rankings by the judges' scores for those candidates in the running. We then match the rankings to the scores to declare the result.

The IPE European Pension Fund Awards are arranged on four levels:

• Gold themed and European awards
• Silver themed and European awards
• Bronze themed awards
• Country/regional and themed awards

Each entrant must enter their respective country or regional award and may then enter as many of the themed awards as they like, including the three bronze awards, the silver themed awards for Active Management, Passive Management and Small Pension Fund and the gold level Long-Term Investment Strategy and Commitment to Diversity awards.

For the silver European awards for the Corporate Pension Fund, Multi-employer/Professional Pension Fund and Public Pension Fund and gold European Pension Fund of the Year, IPE builds the categories based on the winners from across the country/regional, themed and bronze awards. You do not prepare entries for these categories

The recipients of the gold level Outstanding Industry Contribution and Pension Fund Leader awards are based on Editor's Choice.

Entering the IPE European Pension Fund Awards is completely confidential and free of charge and is based on the following principles: 

• We will not forward, share or use any part of any entry unless it wins
• Nominated pension funds will only go forward if they approve their participation and entries
• We only reveal the names of the winners and highly commended investor on the night of the awards
• Finally, we reserve the right to use winning entries to form an article in the winners supplement that is made available after the Awards Dinner and Ceremony and then distributed with the subsequent issue of IPE

We use a streamlined but sophisticated online entry system that is divided into five parts:

1. The first is simply for the category and name of the entrant.
2. The second collects fundamental data such as the size of your assets, performance figures and fund structure.
3. The third is a short text based area known as the Overview and Investment Strategy. This is a 350 - 450 optimum word count text area that asks you to provide a detailed summary of your fund's history, overall objectives and investment strategy. This is a mandatory response to provide the judges with key information about your pension fund or similar institution. Bullet points are acceptable but please ensure they contain enough information to give the judges a solid understanding of your organisation.
4. The fourth part is a longer text based area with an optimum range of 750 - 850 words for your country/regional entry and any themed awards you wish to take part in.
5. The fifth is to upload your logo and any other supporting attachments such as graphs and performance tables.