Your auto-enrolment (AE) solutions are well tried and tested as we pass the one-third of businesses staging mark.
You might want to take stock of your current approach, as 2017 staging volumes are forecast to be twice or three-times last year’s volumes.
Here are TEN questions to ask yourself about your current AE process as a quick sense check:
1) You have a director-only firm where you run a payroll for two directors, do you:
a) Register them on the Pensions Regulator’s site as not an employer, or
b) Say that they are an employer where duties apply, and complete AE tasks including the Declaration of Compliance?
2) You have a director on payroll who doesn’t want to join the company’s workplace pension. Do you:
a) Tell them that they are not an employee, and don’t count them as an employee when making the Declaration of Compliance, or
b) Treat them as a non-eligible jobholder, providing the relevant statutory letter?
3) You are not expert, experienced or insured for specialist pensions advice as required by the Pensions Regulator and your professional ethics committee. When it comes to choosing a qualifying workplace pensions scheme, do you:
a) Use one scheme for all your clients, typically the default Government backed NEST scheme, or
b) Suggest that your client compares schemes, chooses one that is most appropriate for the firm and the workforce and records rationale?
4) Your client has instructed you to act on their behalf; At the start of the process do you:
a) Provide a letter of agreement listing the services you will provide, or
b) Put an agreement in place listing all AE tasks setting out who will do what?
5) Your client’s duties start at staging date, and they have ongoing costs for payroll, pension scheme and business advice in addition to, or instead of, set up costs. When you first engage your client for AE do you:
a) Disclose your set-up costs only, or
b) Disclose all set-up and ongoing costs, including periodic re-certification and re-enrolment costs?
6) A member contacts payroll and tells them they want to opt out of the workplace pension scheme. Do you:
a) Delete the pension deductions from the next pay run, or
b) Obtain confirmation from the pension provider that the employee has opted-out directly?
7) Your client has a staging date of 1st Jan 2017 and postpones auto-enrolment for three months. The payroll runs on a tax month basis. Do you:
a) Set the scheme start date for 6th April 2017, or
b) Set the scheme start date for 1st April 2017?
8) Your client is an employer but doesn’t have a PAYE scheme and hasn’t received any notifications from the Pensions Regulator. Do you advise the client:
a) They should await notification from TPR about their staging date, or
b) Their staging date is 1st April 2017?
9) One of your clients is looking at taking on their first employee with a start date of 1st October 2017, when would your clients staging date be:
a) 1st March 2018, or
b) 1st October 2017?
10) Once staff have been assessed to work out who to put into a pension scheme they must be given information which explains how automatic enrolment applies to them. Do you tell them that this information will be provided by:
a) The pension provider; or
b) The employer?
If you answered ‘b’ to all ten questions, congratulations! If not, or if you would like a second opinion on your full AE solution, why not contact us for your complimentary WPD Business Adviser Audit.
WPD Business Adviser Audit
We will:
· Arrange a personal face-to-face visit
· Review your payroll and pension AE processes and identify compliance risks
· Help fix any issues
Workplace Pensions Direct is an AE outsourced solution used by over 500 business advisers across the UK. You don’t pay us, we pay you. As one of our partners described the service:
“Problem solved and a bit of an earner”
If you would like to arrange an appointment today, or you simply want to talk to one of our payroll or pension experts, why not call our business adviser helpdesk today, on:
0113 4574574
Workplace Pensions Direct; We guarantee auto-enrolment compliance for our clients