"This will ensure that we can educate employers and employees, keep opt out rates low and achieve realistic contribution levels."
However, Mr Boulding says more can be done to help a greater number of employees.
He explains: "We believe the range of employees being auto enrolled should be broadened by phasing out the qualifying earnings lower limit and earnings trigger, so ultimately all employees are automatically enrolled and all earnings will qualify for pension contributions."
The review
Currently, the largest firms who have now completed three years worth of auto-enrolment provision are required to review their automatic enrolment arrangements.
As part of this, they are required to carry out cyclical re-enrolment every three years. Automatic re-enrolment can only be done for eligible jobholders who have already had an automatic enrolment date with that employer.
According to The Pensions Regulator, the employer does not have to assess all their workers to identify if any meet the eligible jobholder criteria. Instead they must assess only the workers who have opted out or voluntarily ceased active membership of a qualifying scheme.
The assessment of worker categories carried out on the cyclical automatic re-enrolment date is separate to the employer’s usual assessment process, which they run each pay reference period to identify whether automatic enrolment or any information requirements are triggered.
The Pensions Regulator has put together a useful guide to help employers work out their duties when the re-enrolment process comes into play.
Figure 1: Determining the re-enrolment window
Cervello's Chris Daems comments: "While there are more smaller and start-up businesses than ever complying, it is important to understand that many larger employers are using re-enrolment to review their automatic enrolment arrangements.
"The fact they need to re-enrol the individuals who have opted out creates a logical opportunity to review all of the provisions they made to originally comply with automatic enrolment."
More to be done
However, according to Aviva's Mr Beswick, more still needs to be done among the smallest employers who are either still unaware of their duties, or just do not realise how important it is for them to comply with their auto-enrolment staging dates.
Mr Beswick says: "Fines being issued to businesses by The Pension Regulator are increasing so there is still work to be done to increase awareness of the importance of getting the pension scheme set up by the staging date."
"There is a very long way to go before we can count auto-enrolment as a success", adds Graham Peacock, managing director of the Salvus Master Trust. He explains: "Employers find the rules very complicated.
"Accountants - the payroll experts - are not getting involved, which makes it hard for employers to get the guidance needed. For example, we have seen many employers coming to us, up to six months late, and asking for help.
