Have you thought about
the road ahead? With changes in pensions legislation
fast approaching do you have all necessary
arrangements in place?
Pensions Blog
Welcome to our blog. We will be doing frequent updates so please revisit to read the latest entry.
Moving house? Don’t forget to tell your pension scheme - 30 January 2012
The average person will move house several times in their lifetime. When they do so, they will almost inevitably ensure that their milkman, the Post Office, their bank and their employer are all given their new contact details. Our experience here at Plumbing Pensions is that pension schemes tend not to be on the list of those notified of a change of address. This can lead to problems with the pension scheme updating members about their benefits and might even lead to the inability of the scheme to pay the benefits when they become due.
Plumbing Pensions has just been contacted by one such member, some 35 years after he moved from Northern Ireland to Australia. Shortly after he moved, our usual annual communications (which we sent to all members) were returned by the Post Office marked “Gone Away”. This happens all too often and is frustrating for the scheme as we like to be able to keep in touch with all of our members (even when they are no longer contributing). Thankfully, as he approached normal retirement age, this member remembered that he had contributed to the Scheme all those years ago and found the Scheme’s website address which he used to get in touch. We now know where he is, can update our records and we will be in a position to pay his pension when the time comes.
While the above example has a happy ending, there are many more examples of people who have left the industry (possibly also the country) and not thought to let us know. While we make every effort to keep up to date, this process can fail where members don’t tell us about their new address. Plumbing Pensions encourages all members of the Scheme to add us to their list of organisations to be advised when that next change of address comes along.
Are you a member who has moved
and need to update us with your new address?
You can easily update online with our form or call us on 08457 656565.
It's Not All Bad News on The Pensions Front - 27 January 2012
It is hard to find good news about pensions anywhere in our newspapers these days. Companies are closing their final salary schemes- it has just been reported that Royal Dutch Shell is the last FTSE 100 company to close such a scheme. That company, like so many others, plans to introduce a defined contribution (DC) scheme, under which the amount of pension available will depend on the state of investment markets when members retire.
Nearly 40 years ago, some people in the UK plumbing industry had incredible foresight when they introduced a revalued career average scheme for people working- in any capacity- in the plumbing and mechanical engineering services industry. Career average schemes (or CARE as they are sometimes referred to) avoid the open-ended commitment faced by employers operating final salary schemes. At the same time, they provide employee members with a level of certainty about their future pension which is just not possible with a defined contribution arrangement. It is no coincidence that career average is being seen as the solution to the country’s public sector pensions problems. It has worked well for plumbing over all of these years so there is no reason why it won’t work well for other sectors.
Speaking at a national pensions conference in September 2011, the Manager of Plumbing Pensions, Robert Burgon, showed delegates how CARE schemes are a viable alternative to defined contribution. The headlines in the pensions press after that event read “Plumbing scheme: CARE a legitimate alternative to DC”.
Plumbing Pensions is well and true open for business and steps are being taken to recruit new participating employers into this scheme. Employers, active members and pensioners of the Scheme should be proud that they are involved in such a pension scheme.
