Benefits
Combined Pension Forecasts can benefit an occupational pension scheme in several ways:
- It’s free - The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) handles all employee enquiries and provides all of the State Pension information and supporting documentation.
- Follow-up enquiries – all enquiries relating to State Pension forecasts are dealt with by the Future Pension Centre in Newcastle. Their telephone number is included with each State Pension forecast and means enquiries can be dealt with directly without needing to be routed through the company or administrator.
- It improves pensions data – the forecast process helps to ensure that the data held by a scheme’s administrator matches that held by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), both in terms of accuracy and quality.
- The process is simple – At every stage an employer receives full support from the Combined Pensions Forecasting team.
- Cumulative effect – As the forecasts are issued each year throughout a person’s working life they are better able to take account of changes in their circumstances.
- Increased contributions – providing individuals with Combined Pension Forecasts may lead them to review their retirement planning and increase their contributions.
- Potential for scheme growth – issuing Combined Pension Forecast statements to employees who are not in your occupational scheme and currently only receive their State Pension forecast may encourage them to review their pension provision and join the company pension scheme.
Seeing the benefits in action
Since its launch, the Combined Pension Forecasting team has commissioned two independent reports that look at the value of the service to individuals and employers/ pension providers.