The employer, which is unnamed and which has a payroll unit of between 4,000 and 4,099 employees, is understood to have contacted the provider after finding part of its workforce had not been automatically enrolled. It is understood that the majority of the employer’s staff were enrolled on time.
The Pensions Regulator has been notified of the breach, although it is not clear whether a fine has been issued.
Now: Pensions says the number of employers it has seen getting in contact after their staging date runs into double figures. It expects this figure to rise significantly in the current months.
The revelation highlights the issue providers face with regard to notifying the regulator when clients or prospective clients are in breach of their statutory obligations, such as where employers register to establish a scheme but then fail to supply data and extract contributions on time.
Now: Pensions chief executive Morten Nilsson says: “The number of employers coming to us after their staging date has passed runs into double figures and we are expecting this to increase significantly in the coming months.
“The Regulator is being less harsh if employers can show they are trying to catch up.
“We have an escalation process where we ask for data, and then if they do not provide it we tell them that if they do not comply then we will have to notify the Pensions Regulator. If they come to us they are on a fast track to compliance, but we can’t help with what they have done in the past.”
