Salary sacrifice: choice of 'workplace' pension schemes?

[JCP]

I am new to brollies. Being shocked by having to pay employer and employee NICs from my already meagre rate I deemed a salary sacrifice pension was the route for me. I enquired as to whether the brollies I was directed to offered this. One said 'no' but was sympathetic to my point that they were missing a trick and might be at a commercial disadvantage as a result. The other not only said 'yes' but said the pension contributions could be paid into any 'approved' scheme. Moreover, it was not they who did the 'approving'. This was contrary to what I have read on this site. So I was wondering whether this was just 'salesman's patter'. Does anybody know what the law says on this matter? Or is it not a matter of law but of individual brollies' convenience?

[Hobosapien]

Ask for a copy of their terms and conditions and details of services they offer if they're not available via their website. You should be able to get the facts in writing and not just sales patter before committing to them.

[lucyclarityumbrella]

Yep - never heard the "approved" line. As a business, most umbrella's will make payment only to their chosen Pension Scheme, otherwise trying to engage with multiple companies would be a logistical nightmare. We have to do a fair amount of paperwork and reporting with the pensions to the scheme provider and the pensions regulator, so my guess is we all choose one company that we trust to work with and offer that Group Pension to all our contractors.

[lucyclarityumbrella]

Just in case you didn't realise, we will do the pension, but into our scheme with Scottish Widows, but one of the reasons we chose SW is that they have no exit fees, so at the end of the assignment you are free to transfer into an existing pension.

[JCP]

Restricted choice of umberallas

Just in case you didn't realise, we will do the pension, but into our scheme with Scottish Widows, but one of the reasons we chose SW is that they have no exit fees, so at the end of the assignment you are free to transfer into an existing pension.

Thanks. Unfortunately, my 'employer' will only work with 2 brollies. I was told this was not set in stone but getting approval (maybe from the client? I am not sure) might delay my start. One of the two - Paystream My Max seems to offer the flexibility of a personal pension. It is a wonder they don't shout about it. Maybe everybody thinks this perk will not last much longer?

[lucyclarityumbrella]

The perk helps reduce the requirement for state pension pots for the government surely, and puts more savings into the economy, so don't think it is in their best interests to cut it!