Teaching assistant pension

boatlife2018

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

hyubh

boatlife2018 said:

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

Were you on a casual/variable hours contract or fixed hours...?

MyRealNameToo

boatlife2018 said:

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

Compulsory enrolment only came in in October 2012 for those with over 250 employees, was 2014 for those with over 50 employees. So unless it was a massive school then no, if it was massive then depends when you left in 2012 but it would have been token at best. 

Silvertabby

The LGPS has always been an automatic entry scheme.  I've never known TAs to be employed on casual or zero hours contracts, but can't rule it out in the case of other local authorities.

OP - as you wouldn't have been on a very high salary, is there any chance you could have opted out of the pension scheme?  Have you checked with your LGPS to ask if they have any records for you?  Note - if you opted out in your first three months then likely you would have been refunded by your employer's payroll, and so weren't transferred to the LGPS database.

Marcon

boatlife2018 said:

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

Forgive me for asking what could be a totally daft question, but are you sure you weren't in a scheme (the LGPS is the most likely)? If you've moved house since then and not given the scheme your updated address, then you won't have been receiving any correspondence. The fact you don't seem to remember getting anything in past years might be nothing more than the eminently 'overlookable' nature of pension correspondence until you get close to the point where a pension starts to become imminent...

sheramber

boatlife2018 said:

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

Do you know you were not enrolled in a pension scheme  but think you should have been , or are you wondering if you were?

Silvertabby

This happened way more often than you'd think....

Caller "Hello, you've sent me details of a pension with you, but I never joined the pension scheme when I worked for you in blah blah".

Me "Did you opt out"

Caller " Don't know what you mean - I didn't want to join the pension so I just chucked the paperwork in the bin".

Me " The paperwork explained that you would be brought into the scheme automatically, but included a form for you to complete and return if you wanted to opt out".

Most callers were happy with their unexpected windfalls.

Marcon

MyRealNameToo said:

boatlife2018 said:

I worked as a TA for local authority from 2000 to 2012. Should I have been offered a work based pension? 

Compulsory enrolment only came in in October 2012 for those with over 250 employees, was 2014 for those with over 50 employees. So unless it was a massive school then no, if it was massive then depends when you left in 2012 but it would have been token at best. 

Not correct. Where schools were concerned, especially local authority (and plenty of independent schools), enrolment into the Teachers Pension Scheme had long been automatic for teaching staff (although they could opt out), and into the LGPS for non-teaching staff.