Agenda item

The purpose of this report is to present the Fund’s performance for the three months to 30^th September 2021 against its key performance indicators (KPI’s) in relation to the administration of pension benefits.

The Pensions Manager introduced this report to the Committee and highlighted the following points to them.

Resource Recruitment & Training

Recruitment and retention remain a key factor impacting business operations. With a further 2 resignations in the past quarter the administration team is currently carrying 9 vacancies across both employer and member services teams in addition the Technical & Compliance post remains un-filled and posts identified to support service transformation are still in development. The team is also carrying four maternity leave absences across the service at this time.

As such the agreed phased recruitment plan is behind schedule as staff movement continues to impact progress. Recruitment continues to backfill vacant posts, maternity cover and secondment to projects and overstaffing is being considered at Assistant Pensions Officer level to mitigate the impact of further staff movement.

Annual Summary of Fund Membership Data Quality

This report shows the movement in the Fund's data from when it was first reported on in 2017 against this year’s interim valuation data as at 31 March 2021. There has been continuous growth in the Fund over the last 12 months and a significant increase of 62 new employers since the last valuation in 2019.

The Liability Impact table shows the financial impact of missing or incorrect data and the direct cost to scheme employers. Since 2017, the Fund has managed to achieve a reduction in the overall pension liabilities for employers of over £30 million. The Employer Services team will be using the data from the 2021 report to target data areas that are causing a significant impact on liability and smaller employers with poor data.

Address Tracing

The members that have been previously written to but no response received have been sent a reminder letter in October 2021 and replies are starting to be received. The members that have not been found by the first 2 levels of tracing will shortly be sent to the tracing agency (via Mercer) for a third and final “premium batch” trace service.

After this 3rd level of tracing a process will be agreed in place to deal with untraced members and to review cases again at Normal Pension Age. Tracing pension members and keeping member addresses up to date is a key requirement of the TPR and data cleansing must continue to form part of our BAU processes.

Workload

There has been an increase in new monthly tasks over the previous 18 months from circa 1,800 to 2,200 tasks per month with the current outstanding cases totalling 4,980 (an increase of 87% since March 2020). The main volume of work is with member refunds, active member retirements and retirements from deferred status. Member estimate requests have increased by 40% over the same period. General enquiries also remain high in volume and a number of these identified as duplicate chasers.

As outlined in the previous quarterly report a project has now been set up to manage the outstanding workload. The project will run for a period of 6 months from October to March with the aim being to clear down all ‘backlog’ cases. Some degree has been cleared already, around 40%.

Charles Gerrish wished to applaud all staff for their continued hard work. He asked if there would be any impact on the team whilst the five identified officers undertake service delivery of the IDF (Immediate Detriment Framework).

The Pensions Manager replied that it will have a degree of impact, but said that until it begins they were unsure as to how much. He added that the Fire Authority have been advised that there might be recharge implications.

Charles Gerrish commented that the figures relating to Transfers In were a little disappointing and asked if payment was backdated to members.

The Pensions Manager replied that payment is generally guaranteed and calculations are based on the members relevant date being the date joined the fund if applications are made within twelve months of joining.

Richard Orton asked why had performance deteriorated.

The Pensions Manager replied that the Pensions Regulator was clear at the start of the pandemic that the payment of benefits was the priority. He added that staff turnover has had an impact on performance in this area but this was now being picked up as part of the backlog project.

Shirley Marsh-Hughes said that it was good to see the progress being made on the backlog process and asked what staffing options there were in relation to the dashboard, as that had potential to also use a significant amount of resources.

The Pensions Manager replied that it was still early days on the project and that a member of staff had been appointed to oversee it. He said that before release testing will need to take place to make sure that it is fit for purpose and that when it goes live staff will need to be available to field calls / enquiries.

The Communications & Marketing Manageraddressed the Committee and gave a presentation, a copy of which will be available as an online appendix to these minutes and a summary is set out below.

Climate Emergency ESG communications

• Member newsletters distributed in Spring / Summer 2020 and Spring / Summer 2021
• Climate change targets / equity review press release

Climate Emergency animation

• Climate Emergency animation - accessible explanation of our actions and future strategy for responsible investment
• Over 500 views so far - distributed via LinkedIn, email, website and staff newsletters

ESG eZine - Climate Emergency

• Includes: Our Climate Action, About COP26 and a Case Study
• Distributed via LinkedIn, email and website

Members’ ESG survey

·  41,365emails delivered - 3,765completed surveys (9.1%)

APF LinkedIn account

• APF LinkedIn account launched November - Communication channel to reach scheme employers

APF 2021 Annual Benefit Statements

• June 2021 - Deferred members ABS available online for the first time
• 810 members accessed their ABS digitally
• As part of the digital transformation process this facility will be extended to Active MSS members in August 2022

Richard Orton asked if the Members’ survey was sent to active and deferred members.

The Communications & Marketing Manager replied that surveys were sent to all Member Self Service (MSS) accounts and email addresses held within the database.

Richard Orton asked if follow up requests to complete it were sent.

The Communications & Marketing Manager replied that reminder emails were sent, but that he was quite pleased overall with the response.

Shirley Marsh-Hughes asked if the emails used for the survey were work or personal.

The Communications & Marketing Manager replied that it was a mixture currently and that in the main it would be good to get as many personal ones as possible.

The members of the Committee were minded to advise that the following resolutions should be made on Friday 17th December.

The Committee notes:

(i) The Fund performance for the three months to 30th September 2021.

(ii) The current Risk Register.