Advisers help drive success of automatic enrolment

15 July 2016

Workplace pensions are becoming business as usual across the UK, with employers confident they can comply and the majority of advisers having now been approached by employers.

The research, based on surveys carried out between February and April 2016, also shows that understanding amongst small employers saw a significant rise from 68% to 81%.

Key findings from the Regulator’s analysis of their recent employer and intermediary tracker research found:

From the employer survey:

• Understanding amongst small employers saw a significant rise from 68% to 81%, and remained largely unchanged for micro employers rising from 56% to 60%.
• Direct communications from TPR continued to be the main catalyst for employers to start preparing for automatic enrolment. Of those employers who stated that both TPR direct communications and advertising prompted action, nearly two thirds stated the advertising encouraged them to look again at the direct communications
• The vast majority (90%) of employers continued to express confidence in future compliance with automatic enrolment (93% in autumn 2015).
• The majority of employers continued to have positive perceptions of workplace pensions. However, automatic enrolment was still more likely to be perceived as a challenge among micro employers than among small employers.

From the intermediaries’ survey:

• Awareness and understanding of automatic enrolment is now almost universal amongst business advisers - and more than nine out of ten are now helping clients meet their duties.
• Workplace pensions are becoming business as usual across the UK, with employers confident they can comply and the majority of advisers having now been approached by employers.
• Between 84-94% of all intermediary types had been approached by clients regarding automatic enrolment services; this contact was perceived to be mostly prompted by direct communications from the regulator.
• Familiarity with the regulator remained at a high level this wave for all intermediary types and the regulator’s website remains popular – 90% of intermediaries had visited the TPR website.
• Most intermediaries either had faced, or expected to face, challenges when responding to clients and offering automatic enrolment services. Around half of accountants, bookkeepers and payroll administrators continued to feel ‘partially’ able to answer clients’ queries.
• There remained significant differences in the specific types of services offered by intermediary types.

This is the second survey in a row that advisers have shown such high levels of understanding and activity and as a result this will be TPR’s last intermediaries’ awareness survey, however they will continue to work closely with professional bodies and closely monitor the impact of their communications to advisers.