Damien Pantling introduced the report and outlined the policies. The first policy was a revised communication policy, a statutory document last reviewed in September 2018, which had been updated to include several changes on the way the Fund communicated with its stakeholders, the streamlining of member and employer newsletter communications and the focus on e-communications going forward. The updated policy increased into minimis amount required to trigger writing to members about changes to their monthly pension income, effectively aiming to reduce paper communications.

Appendix two detailed the revised Pensions Administration Strategy which was last approved by the Committee in January 2019. This was referred to as a statutory document, but Damien Pantling noted that regulations highly recommended this document be reviewed rather than being compulsory. The purpose of this document was to review the administrative processes and ensure they reflected the requirements of the regulator and had been updated to bring the aims and objectives of the fund in line with the business plan earlier in 2022. The section on the service level agreement (SLA) had been expanded to ensure the purpose of the SLA had been made crystal clear. The updated Strategy also reflected the changes in the communications policy.

The final appendix was the SLA in place between the Fund and every employer in the Fund, setting out what was required by each employer and the Fund’s administration team on behalf of the employers. This document enabled the Fund to enforce the Pensions Administration Strategy and set out the detailed KPIs in line with the Strategy’s objectives which allowed for more effective monitoring of those KPIs.

Councillor Da Costa commented that these documents had practical rationale behind them and asked if the Fund had any practical anecdotes on how experience and feedback from various stakeholders and employees helped to improve the process.

Kevin Taylor, Pension Services Manager, stated that the Pensions Administration Strategy informed a lot of things that the Pension Fund did on a day-to-day basis in order to maintain individual reports and correct calculations amongst others. This document set a skeleton for what was required under the statutory regulations, while the SLA provided more detail. Improvements were constantly being made through the technology used to ensure that processes were streamlined and as efficient and cost effective as possible.

Kevin Taylor stated that the quarterly Administration Report included comments from scheme members and employers. Comments from employers were always positive around the guidance and information provided by the Fund.

Councillor Da Costa explained that he would appreciate reflections from the Pension Fund team and officers on how well these policies were being implemented in practice.

The Chairman stated that reports were regularly received by the Committee on how the Pension Fund was being operated and the experiences of employees.

The Vice-Chairman echoed the Chairman’s comments and asked if members of the scheme opted out of receiving paper documents and in to receiving e-communications, and praised the work that had gone in to improving communications.

Kevin Taylor explained that the pension dashboard would provide a one-stop shop for everyone to access all their pensions. He highlighted the Pension Board and its role in ensuring that the Committee was fulfilling all statutory requirements under scheme regulations.

The Vice-Chairman asked if costs were benchmarked against other pension fund administration.

Kevin Taylor stated that while this wasn’t a current practice, this was being discussed at a national level.

The Chairman thanked Kevin Taylor for the work on the Fund’s quarterly administration report.

RESOLVED UNANIMOUSLY: That the Pension Fund Committee notes the report and;

i)               Approves the updated policies and administration SLA set out in the Appendices to this report; and

ii)             Approves publication of the updated policies and administration SLA on the Pension Fund website.