With the current global pandemic, employers will have critical items at the top of their board agenda, so it’s OK if moving your members to a Master Trust isn’t your top priority right now. But how can you make sure you’re ready for the move when the time is right? Here are 8 simple questions to think about now:

1. Is your scheme membership data complete and accurate? If not, you should think about carrying out a member tracing exercise or capturing accurate email addresses.
2. Are there any potential legal hurdles to overcome? For example, there’s a requirement to seek Trustee approval for a bulk transfer without consent, so you will need to factor this into your implementation plans. How will you make the proposal from an employer to the Trustee?
3. Are there any complexities in your investment arrangement that you could simplify? You could align your investment arrangement to that similar to a Master Trust scheme. How will this be received by your members?
4. Are you clear on what your members want from their pension scheme? If not, you could survey your members, find out what their priorities are, and take these into account when you are selecting a provider. This could be anything from reducing their impact on climate change (through investing responsibly) to the need for financial education to support their wider savings plans (financial wellbeing).
5. Have you agreed an optimal price? If you’re waiting for the pricing terms and charges to be at the optimal level, you should agree in advance what the optimal level is to trigger a move.
6. Can you simplify any current processes? You should think about reviewing your current automatic enrolment and payroll processes and consider adapting and simplifying these. This means you can hand over some of these responsibilities to a Master Trust provider when the time is right and potentially reduce the administration burden.
7. Would an at-retirement Master Trust solution be attractive to your members? If you don’t want to move to a Master Trust yet, but want to offer competitive retirement products and a smooth journey into retirement for your members, you might want to consider an at-retirement Master Trust solution.
8. Are you thinking of making changes to your workforce or contribution levels? If so, it’s worth bearing in mind that pricing terms from a Master Trust provider will reflect the size of your membership and annual contributions. You may also be reviewing the pension arrangement, in particular the cost and burden of running the arrangement, and whether a Master Trust solution would align to fit your business needs.

To find out more about our Master Trust consulting service and the specific steps you can take to be ready for a move, contact Shabna or Mike.