What if your new employer client misses their auto enrolment duties start date?
07 November 2017
If you have clients who are new employers and they miss their duties start date, they will need to work out what their duties are and comply with them immediately. They may also need to backdate contributions for members of staff that need to be put in a workplace pension.
If your client has missed their duties start date by up to 6 weeks, they could apply postponement to delay the assessment of their workforce (for a period of up to three months from their duties start date). For example, if an employer’s duties start date was Monday 23 October and they were late complying - providing they were able to give all their staff postponement notices - to arrive on or before 23:59 on Monday 4 December (6 weeks late) -they would not need to backdate any contributions. If the postponement was for the maximum of 3 months, from 23 October to 23 January, then they would need to assess their staff as of 23 January and enrol eligible staff from that date.
However, if your client is more than six weeks and one day late, postponement can no longer be used for assessments on the duties start date. So, they will have to enrol all staff who were eligible on the duties start date - and pay the employer’s contributions (backdated to the day their staff first met the age and earnings criteria to be put in a scheme) and give each member of staff the choice to pay (or not pay) the backdated employee contributions.
You can find more guidance on this subject on The Pension Regulator's website.