The Pension Protection Fund (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2009

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations )

These Regulations make miscellaneous amendments to Regulations relating to the Pension Protection Fund.

Regulation 2 amends the Pension Protection Fund (Entry Rules) Regulations 2005 (S.I. 2005/590) to—

• prescribe European Economic Area credit institutions and insurers as further categories of employer that can make an application to the Board of the Pension Protection Fund (“the Board”) (regulation 2(2), (3) and (4)(b) and (c));

• correct a missing cross reference (regulation 2(4)(a));

• extend the circumstances in which the Board can make payments in respect of certain scheme members who have died (regulation 2(5)(a));

• provide that the Board can pay contributions refunds and death benefits in respect of certain scheme members, despite them having died before an assessment period starts (regulation 2(5)(b)); and

• adopt the recognised auditing concept of a ‘true and fair view’ rather than a ‘true and fair value’ in audited scheme accounts (regulation 2(6)).

Regulation 3 inserts new provisions into the Pension Protection Fund (Compensation) Regulations 2005 (S.I. 2005/670). Those new provisions modify the way in which Schedule 7 to the Pensions Act 2004 (c.35) applies to schemes that do not contain any rules on revaluation of benefits. Those modifications ensure that the Board does not revalue members’ benefits when the scheme it becomes responsible for does not revalue the benefits of both active and deferred members.

Regulations 4 and 6 make the same change as regulation 2(6). They amend respectively the Pension Protection Fund (Valuation) Regulations 2005 (S.I. 2005/672) and the Pension Protection Fund (Closed Schemes) Regulations 2007 (S.I. 2007/865) to adopt the recognised auditing concept of a ‘true and fair view’.

Regulation 5(2), (3) and (4) makes the same change as regulation 2(5)(b).

Regulation 5(5) amends the Pension Protection Fund (General and Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2006 (S.I. 2006/580). It inserts a new regulation 4A into those Regulations. That new regulation 4A requires the Board to pay 90% of certain transfer payments and contribution refunds to members of a pension scheme that has entered the Pension Protection Fund (“the Fund”). The transfer payments and contribution refunds are those which the member became entitled to before the assessment date, but which had not been paid by the date the pension scheme entered the Fund.

A full Impact Assessment has not been published for this instrument as it has only a negligible impact on the private and voluntary sectors.