Opinion – Page 8
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OpinionWill Sandbrook: How can we improve workers’ financial wellbeing today through to retirement?
Over half of employers say that poor financial wellbeing has had a detrimental impact on their workers’ performance, according to The DNA of financial wellbeing report, published by Neyber in May 2017. It is therefore unsurprising that this is an issue on many employers’ minds.Auto-enrolment has certainly helped the UK ...
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OpinionTim Middleton: How should pensions communications be adapted for part-time and job-share employees?
Over the past decade, there has been a marked increase in the number of people working part-time. The need for flexibility in the workforce has seen many people take on more than one job and large employers can no longer assume that the majority of their employees are full-time. This ...
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OpinionAnne-Marie Winton: Auto-enrolment compliance under the spotlight
The latest workplace pensions scheme figures indicate that, as of July 2017, more than eight million workers are enrolled by approximately 650,000 employers. With an additional 50,000 schemes on the horizon, it would be easy to think that the automatic-enrolment regime is now fully bedded down and compliance, including for ...
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OpinionPhilip Woolham: The rising state pension age: another turn of the screw for employers
Over the summer, the government announced that the state pension age would reach 68 by 2039, not 2046. If this happens, thousands of people will wait longer for state pensions. But is this such a big change?By itself, perhaps not. But the state pension is, for many, the largest part ...
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OpinionIan McKenna: Advanced tools can help employees get more value out of their pension
Over the next 18 months employers that only started providing workplace pensions when this became a legal requirement under auto-enrolment will see the cost of their contributions triple. From April 2018, the current 1% employer contribution doubles to 2, and then increases to 3% 12 months later. Also, employees will ...
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OpinionChris Curry: The changing face of retirement in the UK
The process of retirement in the UK has changed. It used to be a relatively simple process. As soon as you reached state pension age, your employer would thank you for your service, tell you that you were free to go and you would stop working and settle down to ...
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OpinionPhilippa Connaughton: Lessons from the Walker v Innospec ruling
In a landmark ruling, the Supreme Court has settled a long-running pensions dispute.In 2012, John Walker brought a claim for unlawful discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation, having calculated that his civil partner, later his husband, would receive a pension on his death of £1,000 per annum, not the £45,000 ...
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OpinionKate Hurn: Taylor Review advocates enhancing rights for dependent contractors
The government-commissioned review of modern working practices by Matthew Taylor calls for legislative change to help determine employment status more easily and recommends enhancing rights for workers.Taylor acknowledges the confusion created by the current category of workers, made up of bona fide employees and so-called limb (b) workers who are ...
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OpinionPeter Murphy: Underestimate The Pensions Regulator at your peril
The Pensions Regulator (TPR) wants everyone to know that it is acting more quickly to intervene where it considers schemes to be underfunded, or where there are indications that employers may be avoiding their responsibilities.Employers should be wary. Even if the risk of intervention from TPR is small, it is ...
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OpinionLovewell's logic: Building the foundation for a truly modern work environment
Changing workforce demographics and employers’ interest in adapting benefits strategies and working patterns accordingly to meet employees’ expectations and needs in the modern workplace is a topic we often address at Employee Benefits. Yet, despite many organisations’ aims to be seen as an employer of choice in order to recruit ...
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OpinionJoanna Bean: Improving financial wellbeing at Samsung
Saving for retirement, or life after work as we call it at Samsung, is an important part of our approach to financial wellbeing and we incorporate this into everyday life and within our varied communications portfolio. It is important to talk to employees at every stage of their work-life journey ...
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OpinionJo Thresher: Tackle common money issues to support employees’ short- and long-term finances
The fact that there is not a job for life anymore means an inability to plan the very long term, which means employers now need to help employees think differently. A lack of financial awareness coupled with a more changeable work life means a significant impact on an employee’s short-, ...
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OpinionMartin Bartlam: Blockchain technology advances can enhance the pensions experience
Imagine you can look up the balance of your benefits at any time, perhaps making a payment or adjusting an investment allocation.You may think that it is not very exciting to have instant access to your pensions statements. But what you are looking at is your asset pool, not a ...
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OpinionRosalind Connor: What the British Airways pensions case means for trustees and employers
The decision in the case of British Airways vs Airways Pension Scheme Trustee was handed down on 19 May 2017. The case, as the judge remarked, has been a lengthy one, and the appeal underway means that the case may well run for many more years. The case is the ...
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OpinionCrowley Woodford: Take stock of benefits strategies in light of upcoming changes
Employee benefit offerings come in all shapes and sizes. At one end of the spectrum, there are the traditional employee benefits such as contributions to an employee's pension scheme, childcare vouchers, and subsidised gym membership, and at the other end there are wine clubs, unlimited holiday allowances, and free-bacon Thursdays.With ...
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OpinionSarah Miller: Key considerations for a pensions change project
There are three questions employers should ask before embarking on a pensions change project. First, they should question whether they can make the change. Employment contracts should be checked. If the change would breach the contract it will need varying. If the contract does not permit variations,the employer might need ...
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OpinionLovewell's logic: Pensions allowance controversy continues
The government’s planned reduction of the money purchase annual allowance (MPAA) from £10,000 to £4,000 has always been a somewhat controversial move.It hit the headlines again earlier this week when the government confirmed that it would delay legislating for the reduction to the MPAA after the clauses that would legislate ...
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OpinionFerdinand Lovett: Workplace pensions and the gig economy
Classifying an individual as a worker instead of a self-employed contractor, as in the recent Uber and Citysprint tribunal cases, really matters from a pensions perspective.This is because the definition of 'worker' in the pensions auto-enrolment legislation is almost identical to the one used in employment rights legislation, with little ...
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OpinionMark Smith: Inequalities in survivors' pension rights
The course of true love never did run smooth and nor, it seems, does the law on the pension rights of survivors. Three recent cases show the limits of how far the courts will go in filling the gaps left by Parliament as it struggles to keep up with the ...
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OpinionSusan Ball: What do the changes to salary sacrifice mean for employers?
With publication of the Finance Bill, the final legislation around changes to salary sacrifice is now available, and considerably more pages have been added. Given the volume of additional legislative text, coupled with the short timeframe between publication and the 6 April 2017 effective date, employers face significant practical difficulties ...