Triennial activities, automatic enrolment and valuation
What is triennial automatic enrolment?
Automatic enrolment is a government initiative to help more people save for later life through a pension scheme at work. It requires employers to enrol their eligible workers every three years into a pension scheme automatically and to pay towards their pensions.
For the purpose of automatic enrolment, workers are put into three different categories depending on how much they earn and their age. The categories are:
- eligible jobholders
- non-eligible jobholders
- entitled workers
Automatic enrolment will mainly affect eligible jobholders.
Automatic enrolment was rolled out in stages between October 2012 and February 2018. All employers have been required to offer a workplace pension to eligible workers since February 2018.
As a scheme employer, you must ensure that all workers are assessed properly and are automatically enrolled into the LGPS where appropriate. The next triennial automatic enrolment is in August 2025.
The Employer Team at Hampshire Pension Services will be able to help you make sense of auto-enrolment. Read their auto-enrolment guide and contact them for more information using the employer hub.
What is a triennial actuarial valuation?
An actuarial valuation is carried out every three years as required by LGPS regulations to assess the ongoing financial position of the LGPS fund and its employers and sets the contribution rates payable for the next three years.
As a scheme employer, you must ensure that your annual returns and all your contribution submissions are made on time and are accurate because these details are a factor in the triennial evaluation. It is your responsibility even if you have outsourced your payroll to an external provider.
Hampshire Pension Services offer Annual Return Workshops each year to all scheme employers to talk through:
- the requirements
- the timetable
- run through the Annual Return template and processes for query resolution
- how to calculate some of the information that goes into the spreadsheet
