automatic enrolment webinar question time

JULY14WEBINAR These slides remain the property of The Pensions Regulator and their content should not be altered on reproduction.

Neil EsslemontHead of Industry liaison teamRebecca WoodleyIndustry liaison team

3 July 2014

Automatic enrolment webinar

Question time

The information we provide is for guidance only and should not be taken as a definitive interpretation of the law.


The story so far

As at the end of May 2014:

• 15,009 employers have completed registration with us

• covering over 16m workers

• of which around 3.6m people were automatically enrolled

Oct 2012 May 2017April 2014 June 2015

Large employers

Medium employers

Small/micro employers

New* employers

Feb 2018

*Employers that did not exist (or were not using a PAYE)

as of 1 April 2012.

Staging rollout

You are here

DM 2777032 v3 These slides remain the property of The Pensions Regulator and their content should not be altered on reproduction.

‘99.9% of employers who have completed their declaration of compliance

(registration) with us have done so without the need for us to use our powers’

590 investigations into possible non-compliance (1 Oct 2012-31 Jan 2014):

• includes cases where employer asked for assistance pre-staging

• includes providing information to those wishing to stage earlier.

Total number of breaches 134

• Informal action

– 28 instructions by email, letter, telephone or in person

– 101 warning letters

• Formal action

– 4 compliance notices

– 1 unpaid contribution notice

Employer compliance - 590 investigations to date


Staging profile (volumes of employers)

Planning ahead is key. Very large volumes staging from January 2016


What to do before your staging date

• Provide a point of contact

• Start planning

• Choose a pension

• Check processes and software

• Communicate to staff


Lessons learnt


Some employers have sought professional help

• Many employers have had professional advice from:

– IFAs, Accountants, Pensions Advisors, Pensions Administrators, Employee Benefits Consultants

• Employers without professional support used information and guidance from a wide range of sources, including:– TPR webinars, seminars, emails, letter templates– Courses and seminars held by payroll providers, professional/industry

bodies, pension providers, accountants, law firms etc– or simply accessed via internet search

You should consider:

• what elements of the duties they will help you with, and

• remember that the responsibility for complying with the automatic enrolment legislation will remain with the employer.


Check suitability of payroll and other software

• What software will you use to carry out the following?– assessment– enrolment– communications, and– calculation of pension contributions

• This is likely to require data held by payroll and HR systems.

• Choices:

– payroll software, and/or

– non-payroll software – middleware (this may be offered by the pension scheme provider).

Information gathered during planning stages gave employers an understanding of what tasks they needed to do, but not how to do each individual task


Test payroll software in advance

Whether the payroll will run smoothly is the biggest unknown pre-staging. Testing therefore assumes significant importance.

Opportunity to test payroll systems in a

timely manner

No (or little) opportunity to

test payroll systems

Least risk

Mostrisk

Time to review, revise, re-run

before staging date

‘Going in blind’ – will have to sort out

problems in the live environment

Check timescales and availability of assessment

module (or software upgrade) with supplier

“I tested [my assessment software] on the February payroll and I tested it

again in March. I’m supremely confident

- I know it will work”


Test payroll to pension provider communications

• Cleanse your employee data in advance – or it could cause errors.

• Providers require employers to upload employee data in a specific pro-forma* - check that payroll can create data in the correct format, prior to staging.

• Although not difficult, this process may be somewhat time consuming. Some examples from employers who have staged:

– Strict data formats – such as rules on capitalisation or commas – so the system will accept the data (eg requires ‘Mr.’ not ‘Mr’)

– Entire pro-forma might not be accepted until everything is rectified – employer may need to resolve these issues manually

– Unexpected glitches• eg one employer employed a husband and wife who shared an email

address; the system would not accept a duplicate email address

– Different field order in form• eg information not in the same sequence in the form

as in payroll system, so not a simple cut and paste

Having been ‘sold’ a solution, the

work required to clean data was

unexpected*New standard from FoAE/BIB available in 2015/16?


Employers didn’t just provide mandatory communications

A reliance on templates meant that

employers did not feel that mandatory

communications were too difficult

Mandatory requirements

Full suite of additional

communications methods adopted,

tailored and targeted approach

Leaflets, posters and

fliers

Training in provider’s

online portal

Notes in payslips

Roadshows and

presentations

Q&A sessions with advisors

FAQ sheets


Declaration of compliance (registration)• It is a legal duty to complete a declaration of compliance (registration)

– confirming that the employer has completed their AE duties as of staging.

• The deadlines is five months after the staging date, but all postponements applied at the staging date must have come to an end before completion.

• Employers will need to provide certain details, for example: – which pension schemes were used to comply with the duties, and– the number of eligible jobholders automatically enrolled into each scheme.

• The regulator receives daily data updates from HMRC for every UK employer.

• Employers may receive a fine if they do not complete their declaration on time.

• You can start the online process early and partially complete your declaration.

“You can’t actually finish until you go live, but we have made a

start. TPR sent us reminder emails about it”


Lessons learnt – summary

• Employers need to know how to do each individual task, not just that a task needs to be done.

• Get help/advice if you need it, but remember that the responsibility for complying with the automatic enrolment legislation remains with the employer.

• Keep in mind the importance and scale of employee data cleansing in advance of staging.

• Employers should test their software in advance, including:– assessment,– payroll to pensions provider communications, and– employee communications.

• Emerging data standard for 2015/16 (eg Friends of AE / BIB) may help payroll to pension provider communications (eg for enrolment and contributions).

• Many employers issued more than mandatory communications to their staff.

• Declaration of compliance (registration) is essential or the employer will be fined – you should not complete it until all staging date postponements end.


Planning timeline - www.tpr.gov.uk/planner


Your questions


Staging dates for new employers

PAYE income is first payable in respect of any worker Staging date

From 1 April 2012 up to and including 31 March 2013 1 May 2017

From 1 April 2013 up to and including 31 March 2014 1 July 2017

From 1 April 2014 up to and including 31 March 2015 1 August 2017

From 1 April 2015 up to and including 31 December 2015 1 October 2017

From 1 January 2016 up to and including 30 September 2016 1 November 2017

From 1 October 2016 up to and including 30 June 2017 1 January 2018

From 1 July 2017 up to and including 30 September 2017 1 February 2018


Useful links

• Staging date tool:www.tpr.gov.uk/employers/tools/staging-date.aspx

• Planning tool:www.tpr.gov.uk/planner

• Letter templates for employers:www.tpr.gov.uk/employers/letter-templates-for-employers.aspx

• The essential guide to automatic enrolment:www.tpr.gov.uk/employers/e-brochure/index.html

• Questions to ask when selecting a new scheme providerwww.tpr.gov.uk/docs/selecting-a-good-automatic-enrolment-scheme.pdf

• Information about declaration of compliance (registration):www.tpr.gov.uk/declaration

• Our detailed guides for employers and pension professionals:www.tpr.gov.uk/pensions-reform/detailed-guidance.aspx


Useful links continued…

More information about pensions and automatic enrolment:

• The Association of British Insurers:www.abi.org.uk/pensionproviders

• The National Association of Pension Funds:www.napf.co.uk

• National Employment Savings Trust:www.nestpensions.org.uk

• Independent Financial Advisers:www.unbiased.co.uk

• The Pensions Regulator: www.tpr.gov.uk/docs/selecting-a-good-automatic-enrolment-scheme.pdf


Useful links continued…

Other webinars:

• Automatic enrolment – dispelling the mythswww.tpr.gov.uk/press/webinar-automatic-enrolment-dispelling-the-myths.aspx

• Identifying your workforce and calculating minimum contribution levels

www.tpr.gov.uk/press/webinar-identifying-workforce-calculating-minimum-contribution.aspx

• Implementing automatic enrolment systems and pension schemeswww.tpr.gov.uk/press/webinar-implementing-automatic-enrolment-systems-schemes.aspx

• Automatic enrolment – are you ready? www.tpr.gov.uk/press/webinar-automatic-enrolment-are-you-ready.aspx

• Automatic enrolment registration.

www.tpr.gov.uk/press/webinar-automatic-enrolment-registration.aspx


Resources

• There is a ‘We’re all in’ poster available to download on our website (you can add your company name and logo) at

• www.tpr.gov.uk/employers/raising-awareness-about-automatic-enrolment.aspx


We would greatly appreciate your feedback on today’s webinar.Please submit your feedback (and suggestions for future webinars) by completing the short evaluation form opposite.

Feedback


We are here to help!

Contact us at:www.tpr.gov.uk/contact-us.aspx

Subscribe to our news by email:www.tpr.gov.uk/subscribe.aspx

Connect with us on LinkedIn:www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2675456

Follow us on Twitter:https://twitter.com/TPRgovuk

Thank you

The information we provide is for guidance only and should not be taken as a definitive interpretation of the law.

automatic enrolment webinar question time

Documents