Home Who We Are Our Services Our People News & Media Contact Us Home > Print News & Media Blog In the News Press Releases Testimonials View News by Date 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 The auto-enrol dangers facing small firms Blog | 13th July 2015 | by Danby Bloch Auto-enrolment rolled out with few hitches in its first two years, when it was confined to larger employers. Between October 2014 and March this year, however, The Pensions Regulator issued 1,529 compliance notices and 17 unpaid contribution notices: a huge increase on the earlier period. This is almost certainly the result of smaller employers reaching their staging dates. Now it is the turn of the smallest employers of all. The crucial date for PAYE employee numbers is April 2012, regardless of changes since then. Employers with fewer than 30 employees can stage at any time between now and April 2017. Most advisers will have clients facing auto-enrolment challenges, so I thought it might help to set out some of the things that can go wrong. Complacency According to our auto-enrolment specialist Steve Wood, the most common problem of all arises from employers not giving themselves enough time to prepare. Sometimes complacency comes from assuming the payroll or pension provider will deal with everything. While the DIY approach can work, employers need to spend enough time on the preparations and understanding the issues. In the case of one client, we had to undo and redo everything – everything that could go pear-shaped had done so, including non-compliant communications, wrong timing and even incorrect applications for postponement and opt-out – all to save what would have been a relatively modest fee. TPR should contact employers 12 months before their staging date. However, letters have sometimes gone astray or are wrongly addressed, especially if HM Revenue & Customs records that TPR relies on are incorrect. We have had several clients whose letters have gone to their (unmanned) registered office or to their previous accountants. Wood warns employers to not assume that just because they have not had their letter yet their staging date is still a long way off. If an employer has not had a letter, they should check TPR’s website using their PAYE scheme reference. Change of circumstances Advisers should also be aware of complications that can arise from company reconstructions, new acquisitions and the transfer of undertakings. One of our new clients that had exited from a larger group was expecting their staging date to be this year. However, we discovered that this relatively small client should have complied with auto-enrolment in 2014. The employer still had its legacy staging date from the group of which it had been a member in April 2012. We had to explain the situation to them (and to TPR) and propose a solution, including a plan to correct enrolments and backdate contributions. Having an open and honest dialogue with TPR and an action plan to resolve the issue meant the employer avoided any fines. Incorrect schemes Meanwhile, some employers have discovered at the last minute they cannot use their existing pension scheme for auto-enrolment, even though the contribution levels are above the minimum. There is a wide range of possible reasons for this. Some providers just do not allow their schemes to be used for auto-enrolment or even to be designated as qualifying schemes for existing members. Furthermore, they might not be willing to put the necessary agreements in place (e.g. for PPPs or Sipps) or the charges might exceed the 0.75 per cent cap. Confusion with contracts The definition of some categories or workers can also be confusing for employers. Some of the main problems arise with contractors, freelance workers and casual workers. One client ignored all their freelancers because they worked on occasional contracts and for a number of other employers but many of them were their workers for auto-enrolment. Likewise, some employers simply ignore overseas employees or those on secondment. Administration Employers often make mistakes with the actual auto-enrolment process. An employer we encountered assumed it complied because it offered its non-contributory scheme to all its employees three months after joining the company. However, the employees still had to complete an application form, choose whether to contribute themselves and select their investment funds. There are other set timescales for issuing communications. Many employers (and even providers) have omitted to send all the required information in time. Salary sacrifice and opt-outs A number of employers have got salary sacrifice completely wrong as well, potentially falling foul of contract law and salary exchange requirements, or the auto-enrolment requirements (or both). The key is to make sure the effective change of contract happens before salary exchange can be used for paying pension contributions. It is perfectly possible for employees to be automatically enrolled using salary sacrifice but only if their terms and conditions and contracts have been changed first. Opt-outs are another area of difficulty. For example, some employers have issued employees with opt-out forms. This is not allowed: TPR takes a dim view of what can be seen as encouraging opting out. Tweet « Back to Blog Sitemap Privacy Policy Cookie Policy Contact Us © 2012 - 2015 Helm Godfrey Partners Ltd. Registered in England and Wales. No. 2544237. VAT 836 1627 24. Authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. 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