How to complete an Estimate of Benefits Form

• If the employee is retiring from more than one job we will need a form for each job.
• The leaving date should be as accurate as possible to prevent multiple estimate requests being made for different dates.
• Check you are providing the most up to date address for the employee as we will use this information to check that our records are up to date.

• Select one reason, this must be accurate as it affects the pension benefits the employee is entitled to receive.
  

Age 55 or over and employee resigning voluntarily- we would encourage employees to run their own quotes using My Pension online.

Redundancy/Efficiency over age 55 – Further information.

Flexible retirement – Further information.

Employer consent early retirement (switching on rule of 85 and or waiving reductions) – Further information.

This section relates to the 2008 definition of pensionable pay which includes contractual overtime and excludes non-contractual overtime. This pay is used to calculate the pension that the employee built up in the scheme before 1 April 2014. We still need this pay even if their current employment started after this date as the employee may have previous Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) membership.

Contractual weekly hours

• Current financial year – contractual weekly hours the employee has worked from 1 April to the date of leaving.
• Previous financial year – contractual weekly hours the employee has worked from 1 April to 31 March in the year before leaving.
• To calculate hours for variable/relief/supply staff, add together the total hours worked in the period and divide by the number of weeks to obtain the average hours per week.

Ill health retirement – where the Independent Registered Medical Practitioner has certified that the employee was working reduced contractual hours because of the condition that caused or contributed to the ill health retirement, please provide the hours the employee would have worked if the reduction in hours had not taken place.

Contractual weeks

• 52 weeks unless the employee is working term time only.
• For term time employees, please provide the contractual weeks that they are paid, including paid holiday entitlement e.g. 40 weeks plus 4 weeks annual leave = 44 weeks.

Pay period used to calculate final pay

• The employee’s final 365 days of pay i.e. date of leaving is the 30 April, pay period = 1 May to 30 April.
• For an employee with less than 365 days in that employment, their start date will be the ‘From’ date.

Actual final pensionable pay

• The pensionable pay the employee has actually received in the last 365 days.
• For part time employees, the part time pensionable pay.
• For term time employees, the pensionable pay they received for the contractual weeks worked.
• Any pensionable extras paid in the last 365 days should be included in this figure.

For an employee who has less than 365 days of pay in the employment due to absences, you may need to increase the pay figure. It is important you read the information on absences.

Whole time equivalent (WTE) final pensionable pay

• Final salary benefits are always calculated using the whole time equivalent pensionable pay figure.
• For a part time employee, the actual pay would need to be uprated to reflect what they would have earned had they been full time in that post for the relevant period of 365 days.
• If an employee is term time only the whole time equivalent should only be the number of weeks worked. The pay figure should not be uprated to 52 weeks.
• The pay figure should include any pensionable extras earned in the final 365 days.
• Pensionable extras should only be included as an actual value so should be added after the pay has been uprated for a part time member.
• To calculate whole time equivalent final pensionable pay for variable/relief/supply staff use the hourly rate of pay multiplied by standard full time equivalent hours (i.e. 37 hours per week) multiplied by the number of weeks worked per year.

Highest whole time equivalent pensionable pay in the last 3 years

• For an employee where the whole time equivalent pensionable pay in the last 365 days is not the highest pay in the last 3 years, the scheme regulations permit the use of either of the last 2 years pay figures.
• If you select ‘no’, please provide the whole time equivalent pay for the last 2 years. For example for an employee with a date of leaving of 31 August 2024 you would need to provide the pay figures from 1 September 2022 to 31 August 2023 and 1 September 2021 to 31 August 2022.

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This section relates to the 2014 definition of pensionable pay which includes non-contractual overtime.

Scheme Section at date of leaving

• Select Main or 50/50 to confirm which section of the scheme the member was paying into at the date of leaving.

Main Section actual/assumed pensionable pay – This section only needs to be completed if the member has had a period of main section membership during the final 2 years.

• The current financial year is the period from 1 April to the date of leaving.
• The previous financial year relates to the period to the previous 31 March from either the 1 April or for an employee with less than 365 days in that employment, their start date will be the ‘From’ date.
• Actual/assumed pensionable pay is the amount the employee has actually earned and paid pensions contributions on in the relevant period. If there has been any absence on reduced pay, assumed pensionable pay must be calculated for the reduced pay period and added to the actual pensionable pay. If the absence has been on nil pay then different rules apply depending on the reason for absence.
• Assumed pensionable pay is calculated as the average of the employee’s pensionable pay for the 3 months (or 12 weeks if weekly paid) before the reduced or nil pay period began. If the pay received in the 3 months is materially lower than the normal level of pay over the last 12 months the employer has discretion to determine a pay figure that represents the normal level of pay.

50/50 Section actual/assumed pensionable pay – This section only needs to be completed if the member has had a period of 50/50 section membership during the final 2 years.

• The current financial year is the period from 1 April to the date of leaving or from the date the employee moved to the 50/50 section.
• The previous financial year relates to the period to the previous 31 March from either the 1 April or if the member started part way through that year, their start date or the date they moved to the 50/50 section.
• Actual/assumed pensionable pay is the amount the employee has actually earned and paid pensions contributions on in the relevant period. If there has been any absence on reduced pay, assumed pensionable pay must be calculated for the reduced pay period and added to the actual pensionable pay. If the absence has been on nil pay then different rules apply depending on the reason for absence.
• Assumed pensionable pay is calculated as the average of the employee’s pensionable pay for the 3 months (or 12 weeks if weekly paid) before the reduced or nil pay period began. If the pay received in the 3 months is materially lower than the normal level of pay over the last 12 months, the employer has discretion to determine a pay figure that represents the normal level of pay.

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Please input the name and contact details of the person completing the form.  The form should only be completed by a person on your authorised signature list.