It was explained to us that the economic downturn will impact employees’ home and work lives and worried employees can make mistakes which give rise to an insurance claim or lead to absence or even illness.

Employers taking proactive steps to reduce this risk and provide support for their employees will benefit from cheaper insurance as well as creating a more supportive working environment.

Part of our solution was to provide an Employee Assistance Programme  (EAP) which supports employees with information, guidance,  advice and even one to one counselling on a range of areas in the workplace and at home.

When included as part of a death-in-service, income protection or private medical insurance scheme the cost of the scheme does not become a P11d benefit and can be made available to employee dependants.

If you would like more information or EBS to obtain terms for any of your risk benefit schemes, with or without an EAP  bolt-on scheme, please get in touch. As independent financial advisers we have access to the entire marketplace to secure the best terms available.

Awareness of these changes still remains extremely low (as we reported on this site last month) but the pain is starting to be felt. One small piece of good news is that these employees do still have potential options available to reduce the impact of these changes.

EBS offers tax clinics (on a group or 1:1 basis) to educate employees and provide them with a range of choices to minimise the impact. Having run a series of events for SAP (UK) we were delighted to receive this feedback from HR:

“Thanks for delivering the tax clinics, I have to say that ultimately demand far exceeded our initial expectations so we are glad that we made these available to our people. Thanks also  for delivering what was ultimately very complex & not great news for some people in a simple and pragmatic manner.”

To find out how we can help your higher rate tax paying employees, Contact EBS.

The range of charges quoted, highlighted by The Daily Telegraph on April 10th, mean the difference in someone with a £50,000 pension value paying anything between £75 and £750 per annum.

With employers now encouraged to review their workplace pension provision every three years to ensure that it remains competitive this research highlights the importance of doing so.

The Pension Regulator encourages employers to review not just the scheme’s charges - but also the investment choice & performance, the administration performance and the support and education which members are provided with - particularly as they approach retirement.

For an independent audit & assessment of your current provision, contact EBS.

The announcement said: “The Regulator will write to all employers around 12 months before their ’staging date’ so that they know when to ‘automatically enrol’  their ‘eligible jobholders’. Three months before the employer’s staging date the Regulator will write again to remind them of their duties and the need to register.”

To learn more about exactly what this means for you and when your staging date is - contact EBS.  For a simple summary of the latest guidelines, download our one page guide.

Key points of the research:

• 33% of those aged between 18-34 would consider using salary sacrifice to reduce their tax bill
• 25% of those polled would consider using salary sacrifice (29% of males)
• 86% admit to doing nothing to reduce their tax burden
• 30% have cut down on spending to prepare for a drop in net income
• £9bn is set to be wasted in unnecessary tax payments by Britons this year

EBS is currently running tax clinics which educate employees about the changes and the options they have to reduce their impact.

One of the most effective planning tools is the payment of pension contributions where effective tax reliefs of up to 65% can be achieved whilst higher-rate relief remains (individual earning £112,950 paying via salary sacrifice) .

The FT also ran an article entitled: ‘Pension relief: Use it or Lose It’ speculating on the possible withdrawal of higher-rate relief on pension contributions as a consequence of Wednesday’s Budget.

To arrange a Tax Clinic, to review your current Salary Sacrifice arrangements or for more details of this research please get in touch before it’s too late!

The proposals are that a 0.3% annual fund management charge will be levied in addition to a surprise 2% deduction against all contributions made. We reported recently that all but one of the companies in the running to manage the scheme dropped out leaving Tata as the last man standing. The Government has declined to pay for any of the start-up costs of the new scheme and has offered a loan which NEST will repay via this contribution levy. Once the loan has been repaid the additional charge will be reviewed.

Several industry commentators have been openly critical of imposing a charge which exceeds the current stakeholder charge cap against which private schemes are measured.

To find out how the legislation affects your business and what options you have  please get in touch.

One of the best things you can do is contact EBS for a financial spring clean - we do all of the hard work leaving you to sit back and benefit from the long-term results.

A sample of the things we can do to help includes:

Pensions

• Do you understand what benefits you have, where they are, what you are investing in and, most importantly, what you are likely to get back and when?
• Do you know whether you are affected by any of the restrictions imposed during last year’s Budget and pre-Budget Report? Are you clear what this means and what your options are?

Taxation & Investments

• Do you have total taxable income of £100,000 or more? If so we may be able to restore some of the income tax personal allowance which you are set to lose from 6th April 2010.
• Have you taken advantage of the tax-free ISA savings allowance for 2010? Remember, this allowance actually increases on 6th April 2010.

Mortgages & Family Protection

• Do you have a valid will in place? Does it still reflect your current wishes?
• Would you benefit from understanding a little more about how your estate could be impacted by Inheritance Tax or the need for someone in your family to require residential nursing care?
• Are your life assurance and pension benefits written under trust (or appropriate nomination) to ensure that in the event of your death benefits are paid to your chosen beneficiaries in the most tax-efficient manner possible?
• Is your mortgage due for review in 2010? Find out what planning you need to undertake now to ensure you can access the best available deals.

These are just a few of the money-saving suggestions we can implement for you - an initial consultation is available at our expense and is free from obligation.

We also don’t make you run on a treadmill….

We have a number of downloadable PDF files with more information which you can get by clicking on the below links:

For further information please contact EBS.