Employer policy and service standards
- Employer policy
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The Local Government Pension Scheme Regulations 2013 set out how new employers can be admitted to the scheme and when an exit from the scheme is triggered.
Hampshire Pension Fund has an employer policy which explains further the treatment of new employers in the Fund and how exits from the Fund will be managed.
- Funding Strategy Statement
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The purposes of this FSS are to set out the processes by which the administering authority:
- Establishes a clear and transparent funding strategy, that will identify how employers’ pension liabilities are best met going forward
- Supports the desirability of maintaining as nearly constant a primary contribution rate as possible, as defined in Regulation 62(5) of the LGPS Regulations 2013
- Ensures that the regulatory requirements to set contributions so as to ensure the solvency and long-term cost efficiency of the Fund are met
- Takes a prudent longer-term view of funding those liabilities.
- Communication policy
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This document outlines how we communicate with our stakeholders. To communicate effectively, we use different methods according to the need and the target audience.
We have five key stakeholder groups:
- Scheme members
- Prospective scheme members
- Employing authorities
- Pensions Services staff
- Other bodies, for example prospective employing authorities
- Administration strategy
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Hampshire Pension Fund - Administration strategy
This statement:
- sets out the roles and responsibilities of Hampshire Pension Fund and the employers
- specifies the level of services Hampshire Pension Fund and the employers will provide to each other
- explains the performance measures used to evaluate them
- is an agreement between Hampshire Pension Fund and the employers
- Employer discretions policy
- Memorandum of understanding
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To ensure that we are fully compliant with the requirements of GDPR, our memorandum of understanding is available below to all employers in the LGPS. This document sets out that participating employers in the scheme are able to share data with the LGPS administering authority without a data sharing agreement being in place. This is on the basis that both the employer and the administering authority are data controllers.
- Template Personal Data Retention Policy for Scheme Employers in the LGPS
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The template only concerns the retention of personal data and not any other data or information that administering authorities and/or scheme employers may wish or be required to retain.
This template takes into account guidance issued by a number of bodies (listed in the policy) as at the date of issue. Some of that guidance is not specific to pension arrangements and there is an obvious tension between the requirements of the General Data Protection Regulations ('GDPR') and the need for funds and/or scheme employers to retain personal data for significant periods of time in order to be able to pay benefits correctly and respond to future queries.
Individual funds and scheme employers will need to consider whether their own administration arrangements are such that more detail should be included. Particular attention should be paid to footnotes 8 and 11. It is likely that best practice in this area will continue to develop and individual funds and scheme employers should review their data retention policies regularly and consider whether they should be updated and reissued.