Struggle for firms to fund pension schemes

Business Correspondent/Personal Finance Editor

Saturday 9 March 2013

Only two of Scotland's 12 surviving final salary pension schemes in FTSE-350 companies are less burdensome for the employer than the average UK scheme, with 10 companies facing a greater challenge to fund them, according to pensions advisers Hymans Robertson.

PROVISION: Irn-Bru manufacturer AG Barr has a better than UK average pensions deficit. Picture: PA

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The combined deficit of Scottish FTSE-350 pensions is £3.2 billion, down by £100 million over the year. But Hymans, the Glasgow-based independent with a swathe of big Scottish clients, says the more important benchmark is the ability to repair deficits, which for the average UK scheme is a cost of 43 days of annual earnings.

In Scotland, only two companies fall below that, Standard Life with zero days and AG Barr with four days. At the other end are Royal Bank of Scotland, Devro and F&C Asset Management, where it would take over a year to repair their deficits. In between come John Menzies (285 days), Stagecoach (161), FirstGroup (145), SSE (88), Weir Group (71), Aberdeen Asset Management (53), and Wood Group (43).Hymans says: "Given current pension deficits there may be increasing pressure to raise contributions, which could impact employers." That could have a greater significance for smaller firms struggling with historic defined-benefit pension schemes. Martin Potter, partner at Hymans Robertson in Edinburgh, said: "Other than the big companies, employers are a little bit head-in-the-sand; they are more worried about corporate borrowings than dealing with the deficit on a long-closed DB scheme."But the survey showed that even many of the bigger firms had issues, Mr Potter said. He added: "They need to tackle their pension risk more seriously, and it comes at a time when they have other pressures in terms of borrowings, refinancing, and maintaining dividends at an acceptable level. "A lot of companies are nursing these deficits along. It is a delicate balancing act, because shareholders don't want to have to foot the bill all in one year, and dividend stability - is key for any finance director."On employers such as Standard Life which had all but wiped out their deficits, Mr Potter said: "Companies at the upper end have in years gone by taken some bigger steps at the right time – though at the time it was a bit of a lottery as to when they did it."Hymans says short-term pressures on deficits will continue, due to the sharp fall in corporate bond yields (used in pensions accounting), a new accounting standard from January 1, 2013 which will penalise schemes with more equities, and the UK economic outlook. But it also observes some "positives on the horizon", including the strength of growth asset returns, with the all-share index up 12% last year, and the opportunity for schemes to hedge their longevity risk.Activity in pension scheme buy-outs has been subdued, with trustees of schemes less inclined or able to buy out the two other risks – interest rates and inflation. Mr Potter said: "It is a good time to buy out longevity risk, because prices are only going to have to go up."But he said the continuing challenge facing employers was to help employees make proper pension provision. Even making the maximum allowed contributions into the NEST scheme of £4400 a year for 40 years might create a pension pot in today's terms of only £176,000, assuming that investment returns merely kept up with inflation, or an annuity of around £8750. Mr Potter said: "In an age where you can't compulsorily retire people, what can employers do to make sure they are not keeping older people who can't afford to retire?" He added: "Corporate and household balance sheets are just as stretched as they were five years ago when the crash came – it is all well and good talking about how people should save more, but it's a problem people are putting off and not worrying about it – that is where the real pensions crisis will hit us in five to 10 years time."

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Struggle for firms to fund pension schemes

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