A panel of pension providers will be in the hot seat next week at a Swindon event aimed at answering queries and concerns about auto-enrolment.
Accountancy firm Regulatory Accounting – a subsidiary of the RFS Group, a leading FT100 regulatory and compliance consultancy – is hosting the event on Wednesday May 3 at Regulatory Accounting: Priam House, Fire Fly Avenue, Swindon – based in the old railway quarter. It is being organised by Swindon AE Support; auto enrolment – also known as workplace pensions – is the government’s compulsory requirement for employers to enrol qualifying staff into a pension scheme.
At the event, which runs from 11am-2.30pm, there will be representative from pension providers, including NEST, Lighthouse Group, The People’s Pension, Smart Pension, Aviva and NOW:Pensions. There will be a chance for employers, potential employers, members of the AE group and pension scheme members to quiz the panel.
Nicki Goddard-Dady, who runs Swindon AE Support, said there were still many employers who had yet to set up a pension scheme, and choose a provider.
“Around 1.3 million to 1.4 million UK employers have automatic enrolment duties to meet, 500,000 of which have now done so,” said Nicki. “This means there are still a lot of employers who need to choose a pension scheme for their company, so by having six providers at our Swindon AE Support meeting, potential employers and any existing employers can come along and ask questions of the provider.
“We are reaching out to small employers so they can make informed decisions about choosing their workplace pension and talk to providers face to face.”
Workplace pension legislation affected larger employers first, but now smaller and micro-employers are being drawn into the system.
In the first three months of 2017 alone, 136,000 small and micro employers complied with their responsibilities under the Pensions Act – an average of one every 57 seconds; around a further 600,000 have responsibilities that begin this year. In total, more than 7.6 million workers have been put into a workplace pension since 2012.
Richard Mathews, of Regulatory Accounting, said the event was a perfect opportunity for those yet to auto enrol to gain an understanding of what the various options are for employers. “Having assisted many businesses with AE over the past couple of years, I appreciate how bewildering this can seem,” he said.
For more information, and to book a place at the event on May 3, email [email protected].
