The Bill is now an Act of Parliament (law).
Geographical extent – The Pension Schemes Act 2017 extends to England and Wales and Scotland.
The Pensions Regulator has the following information on their website about master trust pension schemes:
If you run a master trust you need to comply with duties set out in the Pension Schemes Act 2017. Some of these duties start immediately.
The 2017 Act introduces a definition of 'master trust'. You should assess whether your scheme meets this definition.
A master trust is defined as an occupational pension scheme that: provides money purchase benefits is used, or intended to be used, by two or more employers is not used, or intended to be used, only by employers which are connected with each other is not a public service pension scheme .
If your scheme also offers other benefits, the duties will generally only apply to the money purchase benefits provision. If you are unsure how this applies to your scheme, you should seek advice.
What you need to do now If you are involved with a master trust you have duties to report certain ‘triggering events’ to us. These events may indicate that the scheme cannot continue to operate. You also cannot increase charges to members during a triggering event period. Read more about these triggering event duties .
You should continue to comply with the standards set out in our DC code .
We also expect you to obtain master trust assurance to help you show that you have governance and administration standards that meet the DC code.
Future responsibilities The 2017 Act also introduces measures for authorising and supervising master trusts . These will start after regulations have been developed.
This information will be updated here once further details are available.
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Money Purchase Annual Allowance to remain at £10k 5 May 2017
One of the measures removed from the Finance Bill in the pre-election wash-up is the reduction of the MPAA to £4,000.
The money purchase annual allowance (MPAA) is the reduced amount of annual allowance of tax-free pensions savings that an individual is permitted if a defined contribution pension fund has been flexibly accessed under the pension flexibility reforms. (The standard annual allowance is £40,000.) The MPAA is designed to limit the extent to which individuals could recycle funds and gain double tax relief and unused amounts cannot be carried forward to later years.
The measure was originally announced at Autumn Statement 2016 and documents published alongside Budget 2017 confirmed that the MPAA would be reduced from £10,000 to £4,000 with effect from 6 April 2017.
However, one of the measures that the shortened ‘rushed through’ Finance Act 2017 dropped from the Bill was the reduction of the MPAA.
We shall have to wait until after the general election to find out if this measure will be resumed.
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The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals
Policy News Journal
cipp.org.uk
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