OREANDA-NEWS. December 07, 2015. With almost half a million small and medium sized businesses due to set up their workplace pension schemes next year, Aviva has launched a new guide to auto-enrolment to help make the process as smooth as possible.

The guide, titled ‘How to choose a pension provider for auto-enrolment’ has been created in conjunction with the British Chambers of Commerce and independent financial researcher Defaqto. It contains help specifically tailored for smaller businesses that need to start thinking about their workplace pension scheme.

The guide includes helpful articles from independent experts on auto-enrolment and insight from those who have already been through the process and are able to provide real experience of the issues facing small businesses.

With a huge number of employers starting to look for answers around auto-enrolment, the guide covers a wide range of topics including: which type of pension scheme do certain businesses need, what support is out there to help navigate the process and how to work out which schemes are best.

Andy Beswick, Managing Director of Business Solutions at Aviva, said:

“For people who run or work for a small business, the pension scheme selected for auto-enrolment will play a big part in how successfully that business can deal with the new regulations. The priority should be that business owners end up with a scheme that works well with their systems, is easy to run and is positive for employees. What they should avoid is signing up to a scheme that won’t meet their needs as their business evolves – or that requires them to spend unnecessary time managing it each month.”

Auto-enrolment was introduced in 2012 and made it compulsory for employers to give all of their employees the chance to join a pension scheme and to contribute towards it. Since it was launched millions of workers have taken up the opportunity. So far these have mainly been employees of larger firms. Over the next two years, hundreds of thousands of SMEs will take part.

“For some business owners, auto-enrolment may be quite daunting, but it doesn’t have to be,” said Andy Beswick. “Taking a bit of time to gather in the information you need and understanding the basis on which to select the right provider will help to make it a much smoother process.

“The important part is making sure you get the scheme best suited to you and your business, not just at this moment but in the future as well. The scheme you sign up for should be flexible in case you wish to make changes at some stage - otherwise you may end up having to go through this process all over again. It should be remembered that offering employees a pension is a really attractive benefit and using our guide will help you make the most of it.”

Aviva’s guide “How to choose a pension provider for auto-enrolment” is available here.

Aviva has also created a short animated video explaining the basics of auto-enrolment.

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If you are a journalist and would like further information, please contact: 

Ben Moss in the Aviva Press Office
Landline: 0117 928 5843
Mobile: 07827 832 395
Email: ben.moss@aviva.com

          
Notes to editors:

• Aviva provides life insurance, general insurance, health insurance and asset management to 34* million customers, across 16 markets worldwide
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* Before the deduction of overlapping customers.