Pensions cold calling must be banned next year to prevent people being "avoidably conned out of their life savings", MPs have warned.
The Commons Work and Pensions Select Committee said the scale of the scamming is likely to be grossly underestimated by official reports, and the problem of people being pushed towards "completely legal but totally inappropriate" investments which fall short of fraud needs to be tackled.
It said the combination of high financial value and low saver engagement has made pensions a scammer's "perfect storm", with the committee having heard examples of investments such as diamonds, overseas property developments, forestry and film.
It welcomed a commitment made by the Government to banning pensions cold calling, but said the draft legislation is flawed because it ties outlawing of calls to the creation of a new financial guidance body which would delay the ban until 2020.
The cross-party panel of MPs said a change to the Bill would see an enforceable ban introduced by June 2018.
It has called on the Government to take "urgent action" through the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill, recently unveiled by ministers, "to legislate to protect pensions now".
Chairman Frank Field said that with "every day that passes without a ban" pensions are "rich pickings" for scammers offering over-the-top returns or seemingly clever advice.
"There is no need to over-complicate this: our proposal would see an enforceable ban in place by summer, closing at least one door on rafts of scammers at a stroke."
He added: "Making guidance the default option combined with the ban on cold calling would be a simple but big step forward in consumer protection in the era of pension freedoms."
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A Treasury spokeswoman said: "We take the threat of pension scams very seriously and we're already protecting savers.
"We're bringing forward legislation to ban pensions cold calling, tightening HMRC (HM Revenue and Customs) rules to stop pensions scammers and fraudulent schemes, and preventing the transfer of money from occupational pension schemes into fraudulent ones."
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