Agenda item

The Board has previously requested to be kept updated on progress relating to a number of key administration projects and planned improvements which may have an impact on members of the pension fund and the purpose of this report is to provide an update on the current status and progress against any specific target dates.

Speakers:

Neil Mason, LGPS Senior Officer

Tom Lewis, Systems & Data Senior Manager

Colette Hollands, Head of Service Delivery

Key points raised during the discussion:

1.    The LGPS Senior Officer explained that the KPI performance document was rather cumbersome and it didn’t give a panoramic view of all activities within the new integrated pensions team.  Officers were looking to revise those KPIs so that they covered all parts of the business investments and stewardship and accounting and governance as well as service delivery.

2.    The Systems & Data Senior Manager presented highlights of the report that included:

·         Significant work undertaken on the backlog over the last quarter which was now expected to slow down as the more complex cases were left

·         Performance generally was good over the last quarter and the team were working within tolerance levels and moving in the right direction

3.    A Member asked about comparison of performance with other LGPS providers to which the Systems & Data Senior Manager said that could be considered as well as benchmarking.  The LGPS Senior Officer explained that the reason for not taking part in the CIPFA benchmarking was that it was difficult to find a fund that did things in the same way.  He would provide details to the Board.  Members were adamant that they did not want officers wasting their time on pointless comparisons and discussed the usefulness of such exercise.  It was agreed that what they needed to look at was that the figures were going in the right direction.

4.    The Systems & Data Senior Manager continued presenting highlights of the report that included the following headlines:

• Pensions Helpdesk – good progress being made
• Engagement and Education – a large number of communications had been issued
• Guaranteed Minimum Pension – this was a huge piece of work. The actual figures that would give an idea of what the financial impact would be, were expected no later than 31 August
• McCloud – this was continuing and would be for some time yet. There had been delays in the remedy regulations. In terms of the actual project and working with employers 105 of the expected 127 employer or payroll returns had been received.
• Data Cleansing – work on this was expected to take six months and work to date was on track.
• Address Tracing – In response to a query regarding the age of 75 being used as a trace it was explained that the age 75 had a specific trace on them but all those listed as ‘gone away’ were included. 

·         Pension Increase 2022 – this has now been applied to all member records.

• Annual Benefit Statements (ABS) for 2022 – Employer responses had been good.  By early June 25,000 active benefit statements will be posted to member self-service.
• Pensions Administration System Developments – various work streams were described.
• Breaches – the Chairman of the Committee requested that the Pension Board consider looking at setting up an escrow bank account in relation to death grants paid more than two years after being notified of the death. In response, it was explained that there was a number of these and officers were working through pulling together all the details of those cases.  Setting up the escrow account has stalled following correspondence with the bank, however this could be revisited.

Actions/ further information to be provided:

None.

Recommendations:

The Board noted the report.