Auto enrolment success for small businesses

More than 90% of the first small employers required to put their staff into a workplace pension have now complied with the law.

Around 12,000 small and micro employers became subject to the new legal requirements last summer and the vast majority have put their eligible staff into a pension. For the small numbers that did not comply, the Pensions Regulator (TPR) used their powers of enforcement action.

Although compliance with the rules remains the norm, TPR has noted that smaller employers are more likely to leave things to the last minute and they are therefore more likely to receive a compliance notice which could lead to a fine.

Since the start of auto enrolment:

•    4,818 compliance notices have been issued

•    around half of these (2,596) were issued between October and December last year

•    a total of 1,594 £400 Fixed Penalty Notice fines have now been issued to employers

•    just over a thousand (1,021) Fixed Penalty Notices were issued in the last quarter of 2015

Compliance notices act as a warning and give employers a deadline to meet their duties and avoid a fine.

Internet link: TPR press release

For more information please do not hesitate to contact the team at Ward Williams Financial Services Ltd on 01932 830664 or by email on wwfs@wardwilliams.co.uk.