I’ve been doing some catching up on “pensions news”.

The latest annual report from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) suggests an increasing number of people contributing to work placed pension schemes. Interesting, I’d like to see how the 2009 figures look but encouraging nonetheless. Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Pensions, Pensions Regulator, Personal Accounts, State Pensions

So GP Noble (GPN), the ”independent” trustee firm at the centre of a £52m pension fund fraud investigation is set to be wound up and struck off the official companies register” (“Professional Pensions – GP Noble to be liquidated”).

Good news that this particular ‘rotten apple’ has been plucked from the barrel before too much damage was done and, ultimately, I hope the perpetrators are brought to book (the investigation is continuing and a hearing is expected early next year). Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Pension Protection Fund, Pensions Regulator, Professional Trustees

The Pensions Regulator has released figures suggesting that non-professional pension trustees are increasingly uncomfortable with their responsibilities and are losing confidence in their ability to fulfil their role effectively.

The figures showed that just 56% of trustees were able to describe their understanding of their role as “very good”, a drop of 12% from the previous year. There was also a 5% decline in the number of trustees who knew how their scheme’s assets were invested. Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Pensions, Pensions Regulator, Professional Trustees, Trusteeship

I came into work earlier this week and was struck by the state of the desks. Each workstation resembled one of those fake rooms you see in Ikea or MFI except the computers were not made of cardboard – there was not a scrap of paper to be seen.

Why so? It wasn’t so I could write a blog with a particularly corny title but as a result of our clear desk policy, which has been in force for some time. The whole issue of data security is at the fore again as a result of HSBC getting heavily fined by the FSA for breaches in data security. Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Administration, Data

The demise of final salary pensions has now made the headlines on News at 10 and was the topic of a full 10 minute business news slot on Radio 5.

It’s now officially a hot topic and not just amongst the navel gazers within the financial services industry. Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Corporate, Pensions, Public Sector

I was interested to read the results of the latest Capita Annual Pensions Administration survey. The survey shows that 57% of schemes are on some form of fixed cost administration contract (either purely fixed fee (30%) or core fee plus per capita charge (27%)) yet this would be the preferred approach for 92% of schemes. However, cost was only ranked 5th in order of importance in choosing third party administrators (TPA), with the top 4: Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Administration, Data, Pensions, Trusteeship

Congratulations to Bucks on the award of a Royal Warrant – it must be reassuring for the Queen to know she can rely on her pension administration system when she’s burning the midnight oil bashing out the Buck House Annual Benefit Statements.

I wonder what type of scheme she operates and, if DB, whether the scheme is in deficit? Mind you, I guess there wouldn’t be an issue with the strength of the employer covenant.

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Administration, Pensions

At the last budget, the Chancellor introduced significant changes limiting tax relief on pension scheme contributions for those with ‘relevant’ earnings over £150,000pa, tapering down to 20% for those with earnings over £180,000pa (i.e. the same as basic rate tax payers).

The changes are to be effective from 2011. However, the Chancellor has introduced a new special annual allowance test to prevent excessive contributions in the interim.

Read more »

Posted in: Blog
Tags: Corporate, Legislation, Pensions, Tax