On 31 January the HMRC APSS Customer Forum met for the fourteenth time since it was established in May 1999 on the initiative of Dave Sankey, Deputy Director of Customer Services at the then PSO. This is not the only channel HMRC uses to liaise with the pensions industry. In January 2004, HMRC established the Pensions Industry Working Group (PIWG) as a consultative body comprising key industry stakeholders to work alongside the simplification project. The PIWG meets every 6-8 weeks (in contrast to the Customer Forum which presently meets twice-yearly) and includes representatives from the main pensions industry representative bodies and their IT support.

At last week’s meeting* HMRC APSS suggested the Customer Forum and the Pensions Industry Working Group might merge in future. HMRC believes there will be clear simplified rules and clear legislation, and once the technical guidance is "finalised", there will be much less need for people to contact Nottingham. Time will tell whether this belief is justified; but as a matter of principle, surely it is infeasible to anticipate every possible scenario which might arise when drafting guidance.

* Aries Members login here to read notes from the meeting by Rachel Moss of Aries

Another open question, of course, is how well "e-mandation" (obligatory online communications) will actually work. This has already been delayed beyond A-Day (what will be available online from 6 April 2006 is described in a handout to the Forum). The Customer Forum was encouraged to hear that the staffing reductions planned following e-mandation have been stopped. On the other hand, a number of key staff have already left APSS (Les Shaw, who has been an effective 'front man' for some time, will himself take early retirement next month). The same thing - staff redundancies under the Treasury cosh - reportedly has also affected the DWP's ability to achieve their modest contribution to simplification by A-Day.