Bridging pension meaning

POWER CLAUSE / RULE HELD BY REQUIRES AGREEMENT OR CONSULTATION WITH SUBJECT TO Authority to amend; to wind the scheme up or delay winding-up; to cease future benefit accrual; to shut to new joiners; to readmit employees to membership of the scheme Discretion to set the employer contribution rate; to lower or suspend contributions; to apportion statutory debts Ability to enhance or vary benefits; to permit early retirement pensions and set actuarial reductions; to allow incapacity pensions, decide whether a member meets the incapacity definition, and reduce or pause such pensions; to grant pensions for serious ill-health; to apply actuarial uplifts for late retirement; to fix the rate at which pension is exchanged for a lump sum; to commute trivial pensions; to provide a bridging pension; to award discretionary increases to pensions; to make unauthorised payments Capacity to admit new employers or end their participation; to replace the principal employer; to transfer members’ benefits into or out of the scheme Authority to return...

Spirit (Legacy) Pension Trustee Ltd v Alexis [2025] EWHC 2237 (Ch) What are the practical implications of this case? Pension scheme governing instruments frequently cite statutory provisions. Many also contain an explicit interpretation clause clarifying whether statutory citations should, by default, be read as catching subsequent amendments to the legislation, or instead as fixing the reference to the law as it stood when the instrument was executed. The former approach is commonly labelled ‘dynamic’; the latter, ‘static’. In this matter, the Scheme lacked any such clause, leaving the court to determine the proper construction without a built-in presumption either way. The ruling is noteworthy as an instance where a ‘static’ rather than ‘dynamic’ reading was preferred. Although the submissions turned on the particular Scheme, the strands of reasoning may assist in analogous disputes. This dispute centred on how statutory references in the governing documents ought to be understood in the absence of a stated rule, and the court’s analysis offers a route-map for tackling comparable questions about cross-references...

In this issue: Pension Schemes Bill The Pensions Regulator The Pensions Ombudsman Pensions dashboards Members and benefits Dates for your diary Trackers Pension Schemes Bill Amendments to Pension Schemes Bill published, including new Virgin Media remedy provisions A comprehensive schedule of suggested changes to the Pension Schemes Bill has been issued and is now under scrutiny at the Public Bill Committee in the House of Commons, where the clause-by-clause scrutiny of the Bill commenced on 2 September 2025. The tabled revisions span a wide array of adjustments designed to sharpen the Bill’s remit, define accountabilities more clearly, and enhance how it operates in practice. Altogether, there are more than 240 amendments and 30 new clauses (NC1 to NC30), among them measures responding to the Court of Appeal’s ruling in the Virgin Media litigation, which are proposed for inclusion as a new Chapter 1 within Part 4 of the Bill. In Virgin Media v NTL Pension Trustees...

FORTHCOMING DEVELOPMENT : Section 10 of the Finance Act 2022 will increase the normal minimum pension age (NMPA) from 55 to 57 on 6 April 2028 (save for members of the firefighters, police and armed forces public service pension schemes). It will additionally grant members of registered pension schemes the ability to draw benefits before turning 57 where, on or before 4 November 2021, they already held an unqualified right to take benefits, or were progressing a substantive transfer to a scheme that, on or before 4 November 2021, provided an unqualified right to a protected pension age below 57. To rely on the new 2028 protection, the scheme’s rules must, on 11 February 2021, have contained an unqualified right to access benefits before age 57. For more detail, refer to Practice Note: Increasing the normal minimum pension age (NMPA) to 57—pensions impact. Beckmann liabilities relate to occupational pension benefits other than those concerning old age, invalidity or survivors. This protection applies only where the wording gave an unqualified...

FORTHCOMING CHANGE 1 : Section 10 of the Finance Act 2022 will lift the normal minimum pension age (NMPA) from 55 to 57 on 6 April 2028, excluding members of the firefighters, police and armed forces public service pension schemes. The Act also permits members of registered pension schemes to access benefits before 57 where, on or before 4 November 2021, they either held an “unqualified right” to take benefits, or were undertaking a substantive transfer to a scheme that offered an unqualified right to a protected pension age below 57 on or before that date. To rely on this new 2028 protection, the scheme’s rules must have provided, as at 11 February 2021, an unqualified right to draw scheme benefits before age 57. For more detail, see Practice Note: Increasing the normal minimum pension age (NMPA) to 57—pensions impact... FORTHCOMING CHANGE 2 : The Pension Schemes Bill, anticipated to receive Royal Assent in 2026, contains provisions (among other measures) revising the special rules governing end-of-life payments...

THIS PRACTICE NOTE LOOKS AT PENSIONS REDUCTION IN THE CONTEXT OF ONGOING REGISTERED DEFINED BENEFIT PENSION SCHEMES Reducing a member’s pension entitlement (that is, cutting accrued benefits or a pension already in payment) within a continuing defined benefit occupational scheme gives rise to complex questions in modern pensions law, and there are several hurdles to clear—or navigate around—before any reduction can lawfully occur. Key obstacles include: sections 91–93 of the Pensions Act 1995 section 67 of the Pensions Act 1995 the provisions of the scheme’s governing documentation Further, decreasing a pension in payment may create adverse consequences under the pensions tax regime, which must be weighed carefully before proceeding (see Reducing pensions in payment—position under the pensions tax regime below). A reduction might be considered in various contexts, for example scheme restructuring or reclaiming overpayments, and both legal and tax impacts should be evaluated before any step is taken. For more illustrations of pensions reduction, see Common scenarios of pensions...