Employers who failed to enrol their staff in pension schemes under the new auto-enrolment rules have been fined for the first time. The fines levied on three firms last week point to the risk to small firms, according to experts. The Pensions Regulator fined three firms £400 for failing to auto-enrol their employees into a pension scheme within their staging deadlines. It is the first time employers have been fined for failing to meet their requirements. Staging dates for firms are based on the number of employees and run until February 2018. Last week, it was revealed that Standard Life created 1,168 new corporate pension schemes in the third quarter of this year compared with just 103 last year and has more than 500,000 new customers since auto-enrolment was introduced for the biggest firms in October 2012. Experts warn that while three fines for the 33,000 firms that have reached their staging dates may not sound much, the penalties serve as a warning for 1.25million small firms yet to reach their staging date.....Read more here


Auto-enrolment pensions: 37% of employees plan to opt out link HERE