Pensions

Pensions are impacting every facet of corporate life. Sponsoring employers want to regain control, and manage costs and risks. Trustees must act independently in protecting the position of the pension plan as an unsecured creditor. HR directors are grappling with the role that pensions should, or should not, play in the overall reward proposition for executives and the wider workforce.

Solutions to today's pension challenges need wide ranging understanding of business. Our multidisciplinary pensions teams comprises pensions actuarial, investment, reward and administration specialists together with experts in transactions, corporate finance, tax and legal, assurance and accounting, valuation and strategy, structuring, insolvency and credit analysis. As such, clients benefit from specialist pensions advice with wide-ranging commercial acumen and business knowledge.

How we can support you

Potential issues

 As finance director, you:

• have financially significant pension deficits, which are impacting your ability to conduct business-as-usual as well as corporate transactions
• need to regain control, and reduce costs and risks
• are facing increased cash demands from your trustees.

As pension manager, you:

• connect a number of internal decision makers, who may have competing objectives and priorities
• ensure there is clarity with regard to roles and responsibilities of the various stakeholders involved in the governance and operations of the pension plan
• resolve an increasing number of situations that involve conflict.

As HR director, you:

• are needing to reassess what pensions to provide to your executives and wider workforce, both locally and internationally.

As trustee, you:

• need to protect your position as an unsecured creditor
• negotiate appropriately with the employer
• ensure you are governing the scheme appropriately
• need to ensure operational effectiveness of the scheme's administration
• link the liability and asset management strategies of your scheme.

How we can support you

 As providers of the following services:

• Pensions aspects of transactions and restructurings, including mergers and acquisitions
• Financial reporting (disclosures to shareholders,
• banks, trustees, etc)
• Advisory services to employers and trustees on financial, structuring and regulatory effectiveness
• Reviews of governance, operational and risk management effectiveness for employers and trustees
• Pension aspects of reward for executives and internationally mobile employees.

Our clients benefit from our wide-ranging commercial acumen and business understanding, as well as our specialist pensions know-how:

• we know how to help you manage conflicts between employer and trustees
• we have experience in designing and implementing solutions to the most complex problems
• we have been lead advisers to both the Pensions Regulator and the Pension Protection Fund
• we advise on pension aspects of over 250 transactions a year
• we provide assurance, governance, operational or risk management advice to over 50% of the UK's largest pension schemes.

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