The announcement of the Lifetime ISA suggests that the Chancellor has not given up on his ideas for reforming the taxation of pensions. Shortly before the Budget there was an unofficial announcement that the much leaked (but equally unofficial) plans for pension tax reform would not be making an appearance. Most commentators thought the Chancellor…
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The Pensions Regulator is finding a growing number of automatic enrolment failures. The Pensions Regulator (TPR) recently issued its latest "Compliance and enforcement" bulletin, looking at progress to the end of 2015. This showed that as the size of employers drawn into the scope of auto-enrolment has shrunk, so have the TPR's actions and fines…
Read moreThere have been more press reports that the Chancellor will reform tax relief for pension contributions in his March Budget. In last July's Budget the Chancellor launched a consultation on 'tax incentivised saving'. It was a curious sort of consultation, in as much as it dwelt largely on the tax cost of the existing pension…
Read moreThe government has set out further details about the secondary annuity market. In last March's Budget the Chancellor launched a consultation considering how existing pension annuity holders would be able to sell their annuity in return for a taxable lump sum. The logic behind the idea was to give existing pensioners the same flexibility as…
Read moreThe basic state pension will rise by nearly 3% next April. The Autumn Statement confirmed that the basic state pension will rise by £3.35 a week to £119.30 a week from next April. The increase of 2.9% is the result of the 'triple lock', which requires the basic state pension to increase each April by…
Read moreThe Autumn Statement revealed more evidence that the government is counting the cost of tax relief on pension contributions. When auto-enrolment into workplace pensions started in October 2012, the legislative intention was that the level of contributions as a percentage of qualifying earnings (those between £5,824 and £42,385 in 2015/16) should rise from the current…
Read moreMore employers are failing to meet their obligations. The latest report on ‘compliance and enforcement’ from the Pensions Regulator shows that the recent batches of employers due to auto enrol have not been as prompt as their predecessors in meeting their responsibilities. In the third quarter of 2015, the regulator issued 469 ‘compliance notices’ requiring…
Read moreThis month’s Autumn Statement will not reveal and major pension tax reforms. Parliamentary questions are sometimes no such thing. Instead, they are mechanisms by which the government can reveal a decision on which it would prefer not to make a formal announcement. A good example (see below) occurred in late October in an exchange between…
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The Chancellor has announced the date of the Autumn Statement. In late July, the Chancellor announced that the results of the Spending Review would be announced on 25 November. At the time he made no reference to the Autumn Statement, probably because the focus was still on his July Budget. However, in the beginning of…
Read moreTaking pension protection - yes or no? You can now opt for Individual Protection 2014 to protect your pension benefits. But should you? The lifetime allowance (LTA) effectively sets the maximum tax-efficient value of all your pension benefits. In its first iteration, in April 2006, the standard LTA was set at £1.5m. It then gradually…
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