Have you seen ‘Workie’ in the TV adverts about Work Place Pensions?

As part of this process employers have a duty to complete a declaration of compliance, which must be done within five months of their staging date. So, for example, if an organisation’s staging date is 1st November 2015, they must submit their declaration no later than 31st March 2016.

What information do I need to provide?

• You must provide certain information to the regulator about how you’ve complied with the automatic enrolment duties, such as how many people you’ve automatically enrolled and into which pension scheme(s).
• You must complete your declaration of compliance even if you don’t have anyone to automatically enrol.
• Declaration is mandatory and you could get fined if you do not do it in time.
• Your declaration deadline is five calendar months after your staging date.
• Declaration provides a snapshot of your workforce on your staging date and you’ll need to account for each person.
• You can complete your declaration by answering questions and providing details online. You should start filling in your details as soon as you can.

The Pensions Regulator has produced a declaration checklist to help you gather all of the information you need to provide them with for your automatic enrolment declaration.

Exceptions to the rule

There may be some staff who do not need to be automatically enrolled:

Which tasks do I need to carry out if none of my staff need to be automatically enrolled?

Whilst your staff are not eligible for automatic enrolment, they can still ask to go into a pension scheme. If that happens you must put a pension scheme in place and may have to pay contributions into it as well. Even if you don’t have any staff to automatically enrol, you’ll still need to complete the following tasks:

• You must write to all of your staff to let them know that they have not been automatically enrolled but can ask to go into a pension scheme.
• You must complete your declaration of compliance to let us know that you’ve met your legal duties.

Do I need to set up a pension scheme if none of my staff are eligible for automatic enrolment?

No, there is no need to set up a pension scheme if you have no staff to automatically enrol. However, while your staff may not be eligible for automatic enrolment, they can still ask to go into a pension scheme. If this happens, you’ll need to set one up at this point. If your member of staff earns more than £112 a week (or £486 a month), you must make contributions to the scheme as well. If they earn less than this, you can choose whether you wish to contribute or not.

If you have staff aged between 22 and state pension age, you’ll need to check each time you pay them after your staging date whether their earnings are over £192 a week (£833 a month). If their earnings are over this amount, you’ll need to provide a pension scheme for them. This includes anyone who starts working for you after your staging date as well.

How often do we need to check to see if a member of staff who does not have to be automatically enrolled still falls into the same category?

You must check the ages and earnings of your staff aged between 22 and state pension age (including new starters) every time you run your payroll to see if anyone who wasn’t eligible for automatic enrolment at your staging date has since become eligible. You must enrol and write to them within six weeks from the day they become eligible.

For further information and our guide to Auto-enrolment please click here