On the go: The Department for Work and Pensions has made a number of changes to disclosure rules relating to costs and investments in defined contribution workplace schemes.
Last year, the government held a consultation on publishing cost and charge information and providing members with investment information on request. The consultation ran from October 16 2017 to December 7 2017.
The DWP published its response yesterday, and has made alterations following concerns from various respondents.
It has now changed the rules so that the date by which schemes have to start including information in benefit statements should coincide with the same time they need to provide costs and charges illustrations.
This will be within seven months of the first scheme year ending on or after April 6 2018.
The department has also updated its guidance to require schemes to use historic transaction costs based on the average of the previous five years.
Where less than five years of transaction costs are available, an average based on the available years will be accepted.
Finally, the DWP has brought forward the deadline for required pooled investment information.
This information must be available for member access from April 2019. Under the original proposal, some members may have been required to wait for this data until November 2019.
The information cannot be more than six months old at the time of request, subject to certain conditions being met. Under previous proposals, members would have potentially received details about the pooled funds in which they were invested up to 19 months prior to the point request.
Members may only make one request on pooled investment information in a six month period.
