Business Clinic: Be ahead of the auto enrolment rush

2014 is a big year for workplace pensions as the “auto enrolment tsunami” hits small and medium sized businesses.

In 2013 an estimated 3,500 employers staged, however, 2014 will see a tenfold increase to almost 35,000. Move forward to 2016 and this figure starts to approach 500,000 employers.

This surge in demand is arguably the greatest challenge that pension providers, advisers, the regulator and employers will face.

The potential impact this will have on organisations looking to source pension schemes is quite detrimental. With a reduction in choice, these providers are potentially creating a bottleneck in the supply chain and employers are finding this a costly corner to be in.

This demonstrates that the larger companies have the resources to deal with auto enrolment, whilst the SME sector will rely on advisers to help them. With advisers started to getting inundated with queries SMEs would be best placed to start their planning process well in advance.