USS: preparations for employee consultation plus WATCH recent info session

Following the Joint Negotiating Committee (JNC)’s decision* on 23 January 2018, USS has started preparation for the consultation with affected employees and employee representatives.

'Affected employees' includes active members and eligible employees (who are not currently members). The consultation period is expected to start from 19 March 2018 and to last at least 60 days.

During the consultation, affected employees will be able to log in to the USS consultation website to provide their response. They will also be able to use the interactive modeller (which will be pre-populated for the majority of active members) to see how the proposed changes affect them.

Pension regulations set out a statutory timeline for scheme valuations such as this. 30 June 2018 is the published deadline for finalising the valuation by submitting the required documents to the Pensions Regulator. Read more on USS’s What happens when? summary, available on its website alongside explanatory videos and other member information. 

At Leeds

We continue to commit to sharing information with colleagues and will support the USS affected employee consultation this spring.

We recently asked Mercer, independent pension experts, to host a series of member information and Q&A sessions for staff. You can watch their presentation video below or view Mercer’s presentation here (you'll need to log in with your University account details).  

The presentation/video covers: an overview of the current scheme structure; details of the proposed scheme changes which are due to be put forward for member consultation by USS JNC; and details of the next steps in the valuation process. Question and Answer session was not recorded. Repeat sessions are being arranged to give more people the opportunity to ask questions.

* The USS Joint Negotiating Committee (JNC) is responsible for making a decision about how the scheme should be structured in future, often referred to as ‘pension reform’. Universities UK (UUK, on behalf of employers) and the University and College Union (UCU, on behalf of employees) are equally represented on the JNC. The JNC has met at least 35 times on this.

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