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Small businesses cry out for help on pensions burden

1 May 2018

Barely two months after the last small businesses moved into the auto-enrolment pensions regime, there is a big increase in the cost of the scheme.

From 6 April, the first day of the 2018-2019 tax year, the minimum contribution employers must make to the pension pots of their employees will double from 1 of pensionable pay to 2. The smallest businesses, which may only just have got used to paying pension contributions, may find the higher costs particularly hard to deal with. One possibility is to seek to reduce costs elsewhere. Research published by the DWP suggested some employers plan to deal with the higher bill for pensions by offering less generous salary increases, keeping their overall pay and benefits costs down.