Scottish Life, the pensions arm of the Royal London Group, has announced a partnership with the National Employment Savings Trust (NEST), which will enable advisers to offer an integrated automatic enrolment solution to their clients.

Through their Automatic Enrolment Service, Scottish Life will supply a solution that will enable employers to meet their obligations regardless of whether the pension pot is supplied by Scottish Life or NEST.

The deal will see the two firms collaborate in a number of areas to ensure customers are provided with an employer duties solution for their whole workforce.

Ewan Smith, managing director of Scottish Life, said: "We know that many employers will want a one provider solution to meet their employer duties, but there are circumstances where this will not be practical.  Our partnership with NEST will enable us to provide specific product solutions to clients who require different schemes for different groups of staff."

The key points of the agreement between Scottish Life and NEST are:

- Scottish Life's Automatic Enrolment Service will provide employers with an employer duties service for all employees of a company regardless of whether the pension pot is supplied by NEST or Scottish Life.

- This service ensures that where an employer and their adviser have decided a joint Scottish Life and NEST solution best suits the employer's needs, they can be sure that they are complying with their obligations for their entire workforce.

- Scottish Life and NEST have agreed how they will manage joint projects in the best interests of the customer, including how data and communications will be supplied smoothly between all parties.

- Management information will be available from Scottish Life's Automatic Enrolment Service at employer level.  This will help employers and advisers ensure they can demonstrate compliance with the rules.

- Scottish Life and NEST will work together to ensure employers can meet any certification and registration requirements.

Helen Dean, managing director, scheme development at NEST, said: "Employers have told us that they intend to use NEST in a wide variety of ways to help meet their duties under automatic enrolment. In many cases, that will involve a partnership with another provider and we look forward to working closely with Scottish Life to deliver high quality solutions for employers and their workers."

First published 20.08.2012

azeevalkink@wilmington.co.uk