Spence & Partners says that schemes should be in a position to react to changes to their funding position on any day, making the idea of only reviewing funding strategy at a triennial valuation date an outmoded concept.
Marian Elliott, Head of Trustee Advisory Services at Spence, commented: “With many schemes looking to implement a de-risking strategy or dynamic asset allocation strategy, there is a need for more accurate and up to date information. We are therefore supportive of the recent view from PWC that the Regulator’s objective to complete the valuation report within 15 months of the valuation date is too long a period – but we would actually suggest that schemes and advisors could go much further than simply cutting this time down as suggested.
“Trustees and sponsors need greater clarity to be able to make timely decisions with regards to changes to the funding strategy and need to be able to seek out opportunities based on up to date information and by assessing the current economic situation. The data being used should be accurate and the best technology in the market should be able to turn this into a full analysis of scheme funding on the spot – why settle for anything less than that? Our actuarial administration system already provides figures ‘on tap’, so that funding and investment decisions can be made at any time.”
Elliott continued: “We believe all-year-round governance is the way forward and that there is no reason not to be able to use the latest technology in terms of data management and actuarial modelling in order to deliver this. As well as greatly reducing unnecessary time and advisor costs for number crunching, this approach also brings clients more into line with TPR’s requirements on the monitoring of funding plans and makes them far more reactive to funding and de-risking opportunities.”
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