Workplace pensions law has changed.
Every employer has new legal duties to help their employees save for retirement. You must automatically enrol certain workers into a qualifying workplace pension scheme and make contributions towards it.
The Pensions Regulator has produced a detailed step by step guide to the auto enrolment process:
http://www.thepensionsregulator.gov.uk/employers/beginners-guide-to-auto-enrolment.aspx
The scheme that you choose for your employees must meet certain minimum requirements. All sections of the Baptist Pension Scheme more than meet these minimum standards and the new Basic Section, which was introduced on 1 January 2013 has been specifically designed with lower contributions than the other Sections. For more information about the Basic Section see the explanatory booklet below.
Basic Section Explanatory Booklet
However, other pension schemes are also available for auto enrolment, such as NEST, or the Peoples Pension, and these offer more flexibility than the Baptist Pension Scheme for certain types of employee.
Once you decide which pension scheme(s) to use, you will need to register with them ahead of your auto enrolment date.
Detailed guidance notes for auto enrolment for Baptist organisations can be found in the document below:
Auto Enrolment Guidance Notes (October 2018)
If you are enrolling a new member under the auto enrolment legislation, please use the auto enrolment application form on the Broadstone portal Broadstone Engage Members.
Church Ministers and Auto Enrolment
Most ministers are already provided with pension arrangements by their church and their position will not be altered by the introduction of auto enrolment, provided those pension arrangements count as a "Qualifying Scheme”. All sections of the Baptist Pension Scheme satisfy these requirements.
However, if a church does not currently provide its minister with a pension, it will need to decide (once auto enrolment applies to the church) whether:
To provide the minister with access to a Qualifying Scheme; or
To seek advice on whether auto enrolment applies to its minister.
BUGB has been advised that, as ministers are normally office-holders, rather than employees in the conventional sense, it is not currently possible to make a general statement about whether auto enrolment applies to them. Since each church has its own individual relationship with its minister, the applicability of the auto enrolment regulations has to be considered on a case by case basis. Factors which need to be taken into account include the manner in which the minister is engaged, the provisions governing their service and the overall nature of the relationship with the church. The church is likely to need specialist advice if it wishes to establish that auto enrolment does not apply to its minister.
Please note that, even if it is established that auto enrolment does not apply to the minister, it will still apply to any employees of the church.