Tuesday 2 October 2007

Shell fund to take contributions holiday


Now here's an interesting development that has been on the cards for some time. The pension fund of oil giant Shell is back in surplus in a big way and as such is taking a contributions holiday. According to a report on the Professional Pensions website the company will put employer contributions on hold for at least 12 months, but employee contributions continue at the same rate.

I can't believe that Shell is the only company in this situation, especially when you consider the figures for aggregate surpluses across all UK pension funds lately. It isn't being picked up in official stats yet. HMRC recently put out its annual statement on methods and amounts of reductions of pension fund surpluses (it's here) and the trend is still downwards. But surely we will start seeing an increases in the amount of reductions now that a number of large funds in particular are heading back into health.

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