With presenters from across Nest, the webinar covered what a late payment is and the regulations surrounding it, what to do is you receive a late payment notification and a live demonstration where we ran through some common problems to do with late payments and how to resolve them.
The presentations and live demo are available below to watch again or share with colleagues:
Speakers :
Helen Dowsey – Director or Employer and Intermediary Experience
Paul Terry – Pensions Technical Manager
John Hale – Head of Technical Account Management
Gary Ball – Senior Technical Account Manager
The slides from the webinar are available here: November webinar deck
After the webinar we received some additional questions, answers can be found below:
1. When reaching the age you can take payments – can you take a lump sum?
You can take your money out of Nest from the age of 55. When you choose to take some or all your pot as cash, 25% is usually tax free and the remaining 75% will be taxed in line with HMRC guidelines. Once you take all the money out of your Nest account, your account will be closed. Further details can be found here – How to take money out of Nest | Nest pensions
2. Can a one off contribution schedule be paid without setting up direct debit?
There are two different payment methods that you can use with Nest (direct debit and debit card). Further details can be found here Payment method options | Nest pensions
3. If an employee wants to contribute all their qualifying earnings to pension, they are also opting for salary sacrifice. The employer contribution is 3%. Do I add the group with employer contribution as 100% and 0% for employee.
If you are deducting the employee contribution from their gross pay using salary sacrifice, then yes, you would pay this to Nest as an employer only contribution.
Further details on using salary sacrifice with Nest can be found here. Salary sacrifice (nestpensions.org.uk) & Salary sacrifice | Nest pensions
4. If one employee left employment and is now working for another employer. Both employees use Nest. Can this employee have their contributions merged into one pot.
Yes, Nest offers members a pot for life. This means a member’s account details stay the same no matter how many times they change jobs.
5. Why Is it when an employee does not have a NI number, Nest does not apply the 20% tax relief whereas other pension providers do? This is frustrating as our payroll software automatically calculates pension contributions with the relief, then when we come to submit Nest gives us the error messages ‘calculations are below minimum’
For Nest to claim basic rate tax relief on behalf of a member we require a valid NINO for the member. Further details in relation to tax relief can be found here Workers eligible for tax relief | Nest pensions
6. Are there any other booklets / publications that can be emailed to members
Yes, Nest offers an employer toolkit which has useful information to share with employees. It can be found here. There’s also lots of useful information for members on the Nest website www.nestpensions.org.uk
7. What is the best way to opt out and also what is your advice for an employee who left the employer and now wants to access Nest as an individual?
There are four ways for a member to opt–out of Nest. All explained here: How do I opt out of Nest? | Nest pensions
Once an individual has a Nest record then they are able to access their account at anytime, whether they are in employment or not. They can also pay additional contribution at any time direct to Nest. See How to log in for the first time | Nest pensions and How to make an additional contribution | Nest pensions
8. We have a lot of issues in direct debit details and lots of time spent on your chat. Could there be better instructions?
It would be good to understand exactly what the issues are. Provided the direct debit is active and there are funds in the bank account the direct debit should work smoothly each pay period. If the direct debit has failed, then it will be because the bank has rejected the request for funds from us and we will then tell you what the issue is in a message in your Nest in-box. You will then need to talk to your bank to understand what has gone wrong. We are happy to look into the specifics of your question for you if you could email your detailed query to events@nestcorporation.org.uk
9. Why do payment sources get cancelled after only two failed direct debits?
The Payment Source itself is not cancelled by a failed direct debit. If a direct debit is cancelled, and it is not cancelled by you, it will be because the bank has cancelled it.
10. Can we have clear information and instructions on certifications and tiers?
This link should help Calculating contributions with certification | Nest pensions and this link on the DWP website Automatic enrolment: guidance on certifying money purchase pension schemes – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
11. I have a client whose payment has not been collected from July and payment has gone inactive as client must not have had enough funds and Nest collected 3 times. I have now activated the payment and have to allow 6 days before resubmitting. How can we be notified when this situation occurs?
There will be messages in your Nest in-box telling you that the payment has failed and asking you to take action.
12. Are Nest likely to change back to allow payment via BACs?
There are no plans to do so. We initially gave employers the option to pay by Direct Credit (i.e. BACs) but found it created a number of administrative issues reconciling payments.
13. Where can I get this information:
- Current provider
- Salary definition
- Contribution structure
- Member names
- NI number
- DOB
- Total assets under management
- Average contributions
If the employer is with Nest then by logging onto the employer’s account on the Nest portal. The employer is able to give third parties read only access to their account – see Adding an individual delegate | Nest pensions . You can see the salary definition and contributions structure (held within the Nest Group), member names, NINOs and dates of birth (held under Manage Workers on the portal). Total assets under management for the employer’s workers and average contributions is not available.
Helpful links :
How do I add a new payment source? | Nest pensions