Agenda item

This report sets out the Key Performance Indicators for the administration of the Croydon Council Local Government Pension Scheme for the period ending 30 September 2020.

The Head of HR Finance Service Centre introduced the report and the following was noted:

• During the period as set out in the report, the team had been tasked with increased administrative duties as well as key annual events that was expected to be delivered during the period.
• There had been increased administrative duties as a result of the Council’s staffing review.
• The team had been able to keep within its legal deadlines for key life events such as retirements and deaths but there was however large outstanding tasks as a result of backlogs on deferred benefit calculations.
• A contract had been awarded to Hyman Robertson to undertake some third party administrative duties to clear backlogs, this project should commence within the next month.

Discussions took place on managing the backlog of cases and it was commented that the current caseload was increasing by 200 each month and if Hyman Robertson came in to assist with clearing of backlog there would still be an issue. It was asked what the plan was to manage this in order to come back in line with existing new cases. Officers agreed with this point, in particular in light of the fact that there were two vacancies within the administration team that was being recruited to. Resource numbers were based on the scheme as it was and it was evident that a review needed to take place to ascertain what resource was needed to deliver the administration service as the scheme was becoming more complex. The contract with Hymans was a short to medium term contract to clear outstanding work and a longer term solution must be sought. There would be agreement of KPI’s on amount of cases and quality of cases cleared and sample checking of cases would take place to ensure high standards and value for money of the contract.

It was further asked what the implication of a minimal workforce in terms of meeting legal thresholds for pension administration and what the ramifications would be. Officers said that if legal deadlines were not met, there would be a breach of regulation which would need to be recorded on the breaches register. Consideration would also need to be given to the significance of the impact and whether there was a need to report to the regulator.

In light of the situation, it was suggested that it would be in the interest of the Pension Fund and members to explore the possibility of outsourcing more work where necessary. Officers said that there were providers that could support the function of clearance of backlog and due to the limited buoyant market for trained staff the pool of permanent Local Government pension staff remained a challenging market.

Questions were raised on the CIPFA guidance and whether our report covered all areas. Officers said that a report was brought before the Committee 12 months ago and was currently still a wok in progress as there was some performance monitoring frameworks that needed to be established.

Resolved: To Note the Key Performance Indicators and the performance against these indicators set out in Appendix A to this report.