The £2.2bn Lincolnshire County Council Pension Fund has had ‘amber’ reviews over administration and training.
In an internal document, the Lincolnshire scheme received a ‘green’ review for the vast majority of its administrative functions.
Things can sometimes get a little bit disjointed in transition
Karen Scott, JLT Employee Benefits
The fund received four amber assessments, which show that it is in progress of complying with the regulator’s standard. It received no ‘red’ reviews, which highlight an incomplete administrative duty.
Amber assessments are related to member data accuracy and training of the local pensions board.
Employers drag their heels
The document applied an amber rating to the scheme over its ability to provide basic information to members within required timescales.
According to the Lincolnshire pensions committee document, “new starter information is issued by WYPF, when they have been notified by employers”.
However, delays in notifications from employers have meant a number of new starters did not receive their starter packs within the required two-month time period.
“The employers are responsible for getting the data across to West Yorkshire,” said Jo Ray, pension fund manager at the Lincolnshire scheme.
“Given the growth of employers, the number of new academies... getting some of them on board with this, particularly some of their outsourced payroll providers, is often quite a painful process,” she added.
Data issues occur in transit
The scheme shares its administration with the West Yorkshire Pension Fund.
In the year prior to bringing the two schemes’ administrative functions together, West Yorkshire had introduced monthly data submissions for its employers.
“Our employers went straight onto that, so obviously that helps clean any data and also any issues that are found,” Ray said.
“It just means that any issues [or] questions are addressed at the point in time they come through in the submission each month, rather than going up – potentially up to 12 months,” she added.
Karen Scott, market development and client manager at JLT Employee Benefits and former pensions manager at the North Yorkshire Pension Fund, observed that changes in administrative providers can often bring data inaccuracies to light.
“Different funds sometimes hold data in different ways,” she said. “It’s understanding that data when you do the transition, and then being able to transfer it back into your new system with your new administrator... Things can sometimes get a little bit disjointed in transition,” she added.
Scott argued that the fund’s switch to monthly data submissions will make it easier to administrate in the long run, despite the added burden this might place on employers.
“You can identify immediately in the month whether there have been any starters, any leavers, whether there’s an issue with an employer that you might need to query,” she said.
Scott underlined the importance of effective employer interaction and building relationships between schemes and employers.
“If you’re able to provide them with a template-type system, you get the same information from every single employer,” she added.
Personalised training is unnecessary
The scheme has not received completion certificates from all necessary parties for the training toolkit on the regulator’s code, and local pensions board members have not undertaken personalised training plans.
According to Ray, the board opted to complete collective training instead of the recommended individual development. She added that additional training is available to all those who seek it.
Robert Branagh, president of the Pensions Management Institute, described the regulator’s assessment on personalised training as “excessive”.
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“I haven’t come across too many instances of personalised training… the vast majority is collective training as a group,” he said.
The public service toolkit is a popular and sufficient means of attaining expected standards, according to Branagh.
“If you do the toolkit, and you read the code of practice routine, and you’ve got processes which match up with the code, I think that’s a pretty good foundation,” he added.
*This article has been amended since original publication to clarify who issued the ratings
