Do you have clients who are due to submit their declaration of compliance?

28 October 2015

Thousands of small and micro employers who staged this summer need to complete a declaration of compliance within five months of their staging date.

Employers must submit information to the regulator about how they have complied with their employer duties by the statutory deadline. Those who do not could be fined. If you have clients who staged this summer, make sure that they do not risk incurring a fine: ensure they have met their duties and their declaration of compliance is completed on time.

Visit this section of The Pensions Regulator’s website for more information and a link to a declaration of compliance checklist.

How to help your clients with no staff to enrol

If your client has one or more workers, even if none of your client’s staff are eligible for automatic enrolment, they will still need to write to their staff to let them know what’s happening – as well as having to complete a declaration of compliance.

And their staff can ask to join a pension scheme. A scheme only needs to be put in place if and when they ask to join or their circumstances change and they become eligible for automatic enrolment.

Only if they have no staff, or only have one employee who is also a director of the company, will they be considered to not be an employer – in which case, they should not make a declaration of compliance, but should complete this form.

Early contact with clients recommended

Research from The Pensions Regulator has indicated that over half of micro employers who are due to stage next year haven’t started making plans for automatic enrolment yet. Most of the employers have told the Regulator that they will seek the help of business advisers. Some of your clients are likely to be very late in their preparations when they approach their advisers, so you may wish to proactively contact your clients and find out when their duties start.