Payroll to lead in pensions auto enrolment

Online Recruitment reports.

The CIPP research paper, to understand business readiness for automatic enrolment, includes responses and comments from 267 participants, from a wide range of sectors, and consists of employers, pension providers, payroll software developers and those who provide payroll services to employers.

Personnel Today quotes Karen Thomson, associate director of policy, research and strategic visibility at the CIPP, as saying: "As we all know, 2012 is a big year for the payroll and pensions industry, with the pilot scheme in readiness for the introduction of real-time information as a statutory requirement from April 2013, as well as automatic enrolment commencing for the largest of employers in the next few months.

"Our research has indicated that the onus for implementation is on the payroll department and we are confident that the majority of payroll and pension professionals are fully aware of their responsibilities surrounding automatic enrolment and are making significant headway in their preparations."

The research also found that 69% of respondents said the HR department would handle communications with staff, while 26% said the payroll department would do so, and 25% said the pension provider or pension department would do so, Employee Benefits notes.

Half of respondents have also set up a specific project team to deal with auto-enrolment.