Employers Reminded of Their Duties on Workplace Pensions
All employers in the UK must put certain staff into a pension scheme and contribute towards it – called automatic enrolment
You must enrol into the automatic enrolment scheme all workers who:
- are aged between 22 and the State Pension age
- earn at least £10,000 a year
- work in the UK
The largest employers started doing this in October 2012 and small and micro employers should now also be complying. Only new employers should have to enrol after April 2017. You can use the Pensions Regulator’s tool to work out your employer duties on automatic enrolment.
Automatic enrolment review and future proposals
The Automatic Enrolment Review 2017 carried out by the UK government has recommended amendments to automatic enrolment. These changes include, lowering the qualifying age for automatic enrolment from 22 to 18, and raising contributions made by employers and employees. It is proposed that in future, the amount of money employers and their staff pay will be regulated by an employee’s total earnings rather than their earnings above the threshold, which is currently £5,876.
Automatic enrolment would continue to apply only to those who earn at least £10,000 a year. This figure would be subject to annual reviews.
The recommended changes from the review would be introduced to Northern Ireland at the same time as the rest of the UK, subject to NI Ministerial, Executive and Assembly approvals.
Source: nibusinessinfo.co.uk
