Over a million employers have signed up their staff to workplace pension

MORE than a million employers have now enrolled their staff into a workplace pension, new figures show.

Since automatic enrolment was launched in 2012, there have been staging dates bringing employers and their staff into pensions, starting with the UK’s biggest firms and gradually progressing to small employers.

As of January, 1,032,567 employers had met their duties.

The Pensions Regulator (TPR), which released the figures, said the scheme has led to around 9.3 million people so far saving into a pension.

TPR’s director of automatic enrolment Darren Ryder, said: “By successfully meeting their responsibilities, employers have helped reverse the downward trend in workplace saving so that putting earnings into a pension has now become the norm.”

Currently, to be automatically enrolled into a workplace pension, employees must be aged between 22 and the state pension age and earn at least £10,000 per year.

In return for employees contributing a minimum of 1% of their pay, employers will at least match it, with most savers also benefiting from tax relief on their contributions.

The scheme has so far been seen as a success, with around nine in 10 people staying in their pension.

However, challenges lie ahead – including helping ensure people save enough for a comfortable retirement rather than just putting aside the minimum.

Minimum contribution rates are set to rise to 5% including staff and employers’ contributions in April, then to 8% including staff and employers’ contributions in April 2019.