News

An update on a number of recent developments which are significant steps towards both securing and potentially improving your Scheme benefits for the future.

Data from the Office of National Statistics show that UK households are currently being hit by the steepest annual rise in inflation since the early 1980s.

Criminals are using ever more sophisticated methods to come between you and your money. Here’s how you can help keep your cash safe.

If you’re worried about or struggling to get on top of debt, want help with your finances, or just want someone to cut through the financial jargon for you, MoneyHelper can help. MoneyHelper brings together the support and services of three government-backed financial guidance providers: Money Advice Service, The Pensions Advisory Service and Pension Wise.

It’s not just your pension you have to keep safe from criminals. Impersonation crime and online fraud has almost doubled in the year up to July 2021. As we get more comfortable living our lives online, we need to be more vigilant than ever about who we share our details with. Find out how to recognise the signs of an online scam and to protect yourself from them. And what to do if you do fall victim to one.

In the first three months of 2021 alone, more than £1.8 million was lost to pension scams – an increase of nearly 45% on the same period in 2020. To help combat this, the Government is expected to bring in new regulations that allow pension-scheme managers or trustees to block transfers out of regulated schemes into arrangements that do not meet certain criteria.

You’d think it would be difficult to save into a pension for years and then forget about it, but for a lot of people that’s exactly what’s happened. In 2020 there were 1.6 million pension pots lying unclaimed, worth a total of £19.4 billion. But there is a simple way to track down any pensions you’ve lost touch with by using the Government’s free Pension Tracing Service.

Your pension increases each year according to the Scheme you are a member of and the attributing factors.

An update from the Trustee on the bulk annuity buy in with Legal & General to help provide further security for future benefit payments and pension increases.

We know that the ever-changing nature of COVID-19 is worrying for everyone. We want to reassure you that the Trustee and the Scheme administrator are working hard to deliver the best possible service to help protect our members in these challenging times.

You’ll have a lot on your mind at the moment as you try to keep you and your loved ones safe. Whatever precautions you’re taking to stay safe, don’t forget to keep your pension safe too.

The GMP is the minimum pension that defined benefit (DB) schemes, like the Scheme, have to pay members that were contracted out of the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme (SERPS) and the State Second Pension (S2P) between 6 April 1978 and 5 April 1997.

In October 2018, the High Court found that, in some cases, this left both men and women worse off. It ruled that DB schemes must equalise the GMP for anyone affected.