Agenda item

To update the Pension Board on various pensions administration matters as part of its remit to oversee the administration of the Brent Pension Fund.

Sawan Shah (Brent Council - Senior Finance Analyst) introduced the report updating the Pension Board on various pensions administration matters as part of its remit to oversee the administration of the Brent Pension Fund.

In considering the report, the Board noted:

• The Pension Administration performance update for the period October – December 2021, as detailed within Appendix 1 of the report.
• The percentage of cases processed on time had remained high with a quarterly average of 99.1%. This was above the 98% target.
• An update was then provided to the Board regarding Helpdesk call performance. The Fund had improved performance in its wait times through the quarter with performance of 3 minutes 59 seconds in October, 3 minutes 29 seconds in November and 3 minute 14 seconds in December. All three months were at or below the target time of 4 minutes.
• The number of complaints remained low, and the Fund’s data scores improved over the period.
• In relation to the data cleanse project carried out by the Fund, Members were reminded that the Fund had previously commissioned a separate project to review and resolve outstanding leaver queries. Additionally, the work commissioned regarding the Guaranteed Minimum Pensions (GMP) reconciliations projected was also highlighted, with the Board updated that both work streams were now coming to a close. The data cleanse project was concluded on 22 February 2022, with 88% of cases within its scope being completed. The remainder of cases would be completed as part of the year end process. At the closure of the GMP project on 03 February 2022, all 1,448 cases had been reviewed and actioned with remedial action taken where required.
• The Board then received an update on the re-enrolment process. Members were notified that every three years every employer had a duty to assess and reenrol staff who had left workplace pension schemes. The intention of this process was to ensure staff were aware that when they opted out of the scheme, they were potentially losing out on benefits in retirement, as well as ensuring automatic enrolment onto the scheme. A full breakdown of the statistics on reenrolment was provided in section 7.5 of the report. 
• The Board were provided with an update on the LGPS bulletins issued since the last Pension Board meeting, which had been included as appendices to the report. The Board’s attention was drawn to a Government white paper, which had suggested that there was an intention for 5% of LGPS assets to be invested in local projects. Further detail was being sought as to what this would mean in practice.
• Members noted that the minimum pension age would increase from 55 to 57, effective from 2028.

John Crowhurst (Operations Director, LPP) then provided the Board with a presentation outlining key business and performance updates within the LPP Quarterly & Annual Brent Pension Fund Administration Report.  Key issues highlighted were as follows:

Referring firstly to the Quarterly Administration report, members were advised this covered the period October – December 21, which had been published with the agenda pack. The Board noted the detailed performance updates provided in relation to the Leavers and Data Cleanse projects. In addition, it was updated that the total number of ongoing cases in the workflow systems had reduced significantly during the quarter, from 1110 to 150 cases. Historical cases were aiming to be addressed in preparation for the migration over to the new Pensions Administration system.

Moving on to help desk performance, it was noted that the satisfaction scores from people interacting with the help desk were generally above the 85% target. There had also been a steady increase in the number of Members who had registered for the My Pension Online service, an increase from 3240 to 3383. Moving on to discuss the data scores, it was highlighted that the common data score stood at 95.6%, compared to January 2020 when it was 94%. The majority of data errors were due to deferred members, with whom contact had been lost. Work was ongoing to attempt to trace these members and ensure they were registered with My Pension Online. Moving on to the conditional data score, it was highlighted that this currently stood at 85.2%. This was compared to a figure of 59% in January 2020, showing significant improvement. There were opportunities to improve this score, which would be built upon at the beginning of the next financial year. This work would involve housekeeping, and potentially further work on data cleanse projects. 

John Crowhurst then provided the Board with an update regarding Project PACE. Members were reminded this related to the introduction of a new pension administration system known as Universal Pensions Management (UPM) which would replace the current core five systems through which the various aspect of the Fund were currently administered. 

John Crowhurst updated that since the last update, the system had gone live. This included 3 LGPS Funds, comprising of 58,000 members. Alongside other launches, there were around 300,000 members on the new system, which amounted to around half of the membership that services were provided to. Over 100 operational staff had been trained in using the new system, including staff processing casework, payroll experts and help desk advisors. This number would increase as part of the phase 2 go live process, of which Brent were a part. From a member perspective, it was updated there was a new member portal called pension point, which had 12,000 members enrolled and actively using since the system had gone live. It was noted that whilst some features of the new system were available from day one, functionality would gradually be increased as the system was rolled out further.

Focusing on the Brent launch of the new system, it was clarified that there were checks and balances in place to ensure the launch was successful. This included things such as successful data migration, and ensuring that data integrity was maintained. There were also ongoing tests to ensure that the system performance was stable and that multiple users were able to access the site simultaneously. 

In terms of lessons learned from the go live process, it was updated that the processing of images from member records had taken longer than anticipated. Since then, the images had been uploaded prior to the go live date. The second lesson was highlighted as ensuring that users could log in a few days prior to the go live date to ensure that they had full access from day one.

Finally, John Crowhurst addressed the fact that help desk wait times had increased. Since the go live date, members had been waiting for up to 15 minutes to speak to staff. As a result, further staff had been deployed to work on the help desk, as well as a dedicated line for queries regarding the new member portal. As a result, wait times had reduced to 10 minutes, and the wait times would continue to be monitored.

Members were then invited to ask questions on the update provided, which are summarised below:

·                It was noted that Brent Officers were continuously monitoring the progress of Project PACE, and were pleased with the progress currently made by LPP.

·                It was asked how secure the new system was from cyber-attacks, and it was clarified that penetration tests had been carried out on the security of the system prior to going live, and that there had been no concerns raised as part of this. 

·                The go live date for phase 2 clients (including Brent), would be communicated with Officers in due course.

As there were no further questions from Members, the Chair thanked John Crowhurst and officers for the update and it was RESOLVED that the report be noted with a further update on progress with Project PACE to be provided for the next meeting.