Hi Diane,

The Automatic Enrolment Jobholder Letter will not be sent out if the employees are already part of a pension scheme. this is because they won't be automatically enrolled onto the scheme.

Regarding when the employees can opt-out, it is normal practice to assess the employees and enrol them. The employees can then contact the provider and advise that they wish to opt-out. If this is done within the opt-out period, they will be eligible for refunds.

I recommend speaking to your provider to confirm if it's OK for an employee to opt-out before the first assessment.

Thanks,

Brian

Brian,

Thanks for response, the pre-existing company pension scheme did not meet the criteria for AE (as notified to us by the Provider), so we have put in place a second scheme which does meet AE and it is this scheme that I have assessed employees and the PM has highlighted several individuals who require Jobholder letters to be issued.

Two employees (one already at SRA and one due later this year) have verbally informed me they don't wish to enrol, but also don't want a deduction from this first payroll run after Staging!

Hi Diane,

If the existing scheme doesn't have the Qualifying Scheme check box selected within Company > Pensions Schemes > Edit > Details, the employees will then be able to be enrolled to the second scheme which is set as the Qualifying Scheme.

Once the employees are enrolled, the Automatic Enrolment Jobholder Letter will then be able to be sent to the employees. This needs to be sent within the six weeks after the date the employee was enrolled.

For more information on sending pension correspondence, click here

In order to opt-out before any contributions are taken, unfortunately verbal confirmation from the employee isnâ€t sufficient. Providers usually want the employees to be assessed and then enrolled for the relevant documents to be created and uploaded. When the employee opts-out, within the opt-out period, refunds are then provided.

If the provider agrees that the employee can opt-out before contributing, it would simply be a case of selecting to opt-out on the first assessment. This means that the employee will have no contributions. This needs to be authorised by the pension provider rather than ourselves.

I hope this info helps you Diane. Give me a shout if you would like any further info.

Brian