Auto-enrolment: Hundreds of thousands of firms to shun advice

Nearly 300,000 small employers will shun advice when choosing a pension scheme to comply with auto-enrolment. That was the finding of research by The Pensions Regulator, which reported that one in five micro businesses would not make approaches for guidance, while one in ten (130,000) did not know how to select a scheme, or thought it will be difficult.The regulator has announced plans to address the risk of non-compliance caused by employers failing to find an available scheme for staff.This includes a proposal to publish a list of schemes on its website early in 2015.Schemes on the list will have to meet key criteria. In particular they must accept any employer irrespective of how many staff they have or how much they pay. The list may also indicate whether a scheme holds independent master trust assurance and/or has a public service obligation. {desktop}{/desktop}{mobile}{/mobile} Providers will be required to ensure schemes continue to meet the criteria while the regulator will remove schemes if regulatory concerns arise.Charles Counsell, TPR executive director for automatic enrolment, said: "The needs and behaviours of small and micro employers preparing for automatic enrolment are expected to be very different to the large and medium organisations which have already successfully staged."In line with our educate and enable approach, we are working to understand those needs, particularly the ability for small and micro employers to identify a pension scheme they can use to comply with automatic enrolment without the help of advisors."We want to head off the risk that small and micro employers may struggle to comply because they lack the information they need to identify a scheme for their staff. It is important employers benefit from information from the regulator about a selection of those schemes that have confirmed to us they are available."The regulator said the list is intended as a starting point and it will also make clear on its website that there may be more suitable schemes in the open market, particularly for larger employers or for those with higher paid workers.A guide to the short consultation is available on the regulator's website and feedback can be sent to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Auto-enrolment: Hundreds of thousands of firms to shun advice

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