FD’s specialist approach to AE planning

At today’s auto-enrolment workshop for the charity sector, Ian Bird, equity partner at Foster Denovo, will join forces with the Pensions Regulator, AEGON and the Department for Work and Pensions, to highlight the practical steps that organisations need to consider.

Ian Bird commented: “Starting in October 2012, the largest employers in the UK began auto-enrolling their eligible employees into a workplace pension and contributing towards their retirement.

“All employers will have a staging date when they will have to start to auto-enrol their workforce. This is a fundamental change within the pensions’ landscape and shifts the onus of retirement saving squarely onto the employer.

“I receive many questions regarding auto-enrolment but the one that I am asked most frequently by charities, is ‘what do we actually have to do to comply with the legislation?”.

The timeline below highlights the auto-enrolment process and timeline:

Stages of auto-enrolment process (date when stage needs to be completed)

Step 1 – Know your staging date (act now)

Step 2 – Assess your workforce (15-12 months ahead of staging date)

Step 3 – Review your pension arrangements (12-9 months ahead of staging date)

Step 4 – Communicate the changes to all your workforce (9-6 months ahead of staging date)

Step 5 – Automatically enrol eligible employees (on staging date)

Step 6 – Register with The Pension Regulator & keep records (within 4 months of staging date)

Step 7 – Contribute to your workers’ pensions within time limits

Ongoing processes for example opt ins and entitled workers, opt outs and refunds, re-enrolment.

Bird added: “In our experience, many employers underestimate the time and resource they will require to deliver auto-enrolment within their organisations.

To read more about the key stages, please click here.