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In November, a landmark court judgment ruled that defined benefit (DB) schemes that provided GMPs must revisit and, where necessary, top-up historic cash equivalent transfer values (CETVs) that have been calculated on an unequal basis.
The second instalment of GMP equalisation litigation involving Lloyds Banking Group's DB pension schemes clarified an earlier judgment in 2018 that ruled GMPs must be equalised and arrears paid.
But, while the need for schemes to equalise GMPs is now much clearer, the way in which they do so is still unclear for many schemes, with a range of methods available for them to use.
The scale of the challenge ahead is huge – and many schemes will need to go review and possibly amend, data and payments going back nearly 30 years.
This webinar will bring together views from actuaries, lawyers, administrators, trustees and data experts to look at the pragmatic, collaborative solutions that are open to schemes to solve the GMP equalisation challenges in 2021.
It will assess the individual challenges schemes face with equalisations and provide some practical options that are available to resolve these issues.
Jonathan is editor of Professional Pensions and has been reporting on UK occupational pensions since 2001. He has won a number of awards during his career, most recently the SPP Trade Journalist of the Year Award in 2019. He is also holder of the PMI's Retirement Provision Certificate.
Stewart joined Equiniti as Lead Project Consultant in May 2013 to lead the contracting-out reconciliation on a scheme that, at the time, was the 5th biggest buy-out in UK history. With news of the abolition of contracting-out Stewart developed the wider proposal, further developing highly automated tools, to provide solutions for all schemes that need to carry out this exercise. In April 2015 Stewart became the Operations Director within Data Solutions to head up Equiniti’s contracting-out reconciliation service, providing robust methodical solutions for both live and ceased schemes within the private and public sectors. From the extensive experience gained as a result of GMP abolition, Stewart has naturally progressed into GMP equalisation. With the pensions’ industry initially viewing GMP equalisation to be extremely data intensive, Stewart advocates utilising pragmatic less data demanding solutions.
Stewart graduated with an Honours degree in Mathematics and has also studied for a Masters in Business Administration (MBA), gaining diplomas in Business and Business Strategic Management. Stewart has been working in the pension’s industry for the best part of 20 years, starting at Mercer as an administrator before moving into programming of pension systems and database management. Before moving to Equiniti, Stewart worked at Xafinity for the best part of ten years as a project manager and national lead of the administration on discontinuance schemes, specialising in the reconciliation process of contracted-out schemes.
Donna is a qualified actuary with 13 years of consulting experience at Hymans Robertson. She has had a varied range of Trustee clients and roles at Hymans Robertson across her career, including managing the launch of a team of valuation experts and analysts. More recently, some of her clients have taken an early plunge on GMP equalisation, meaning she has valuable experience of already putting some of the theory into practice. Outside of work, Donna enjoys spending time with her young daughter.
Simon is a Managing Associate in Linklaters pensions practice. Simon advises on all areas of pensions law including all aspects of pension scheme regulation and compliance, de-risking and liability management, investment and funding matters, disputes and corporate transactions and restructurings.
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