Scheme member data quality - for public service pension schemes (PSPS) only

This section was named 'record-keeping' in previous scheme returns. The questions have been updated to reflect our expectations that schemes should have processes to monitor members' data quality on an ongoing basis and assess the need for a data review exercise at least every year.

Common data

These questions relate to the quality of your common data. Common data is needed to uniquely identify and engage with a member:

Date of birth
National Insurance number
Member's scheme identification number, if applicable
Sex
Date of birth
Date pensionable service started, membership or policy start date or first contribution date
Expected retirement or maturity date, also known as target retirement age. For pensioners, this is their actual pension commenced date (crystallisation date)
Membership status, such as active, deferred, pensioner - this can be mixed where part but not all of the benefits are being taken
Last status event: the date at which the membership status last changed, for example from active to deferred. Where appropriate, you should also capture the reason for the change in status, such as retired or opted out
Member contact details including either postcode, personal telephone number, personal email address or a combination of these

Please note: scheme managers of PSPS are legally required to keep certain data items. These are set out in our scheme member data quality guidance.

Have you measured the scheme's common data in the last 12 months?

You should confirm whether you have measured your common data in the last 12 months. The last 12 months is defined as the calendar year prior to the completion date of this current scheme return. This can be found on the Scheme Options page when selecting 'Complete scheme return'.

If you answer 'No' to this question, you will be asked a follow-up questions about whether you have assessed the need to review the common data or not.

If you answer 'Yes' to this question, you will be asked to input the common data score and the date the common data was last measured.

Have you assessed the need for a data review exercise on the scheme's common data within the last 12 months?

If you answer 'No' to the above question you will be asked a follow-up question regarding whether you have gone through an exercise to assess whether the scheme specific data needs to be reviewed within the last 12 months.

This includes where you've considered the need to review this data as part of a wider exercise, for example as part of a derisking project, or while preparing for a change in administrator. You can answer 'Yes' or 'No' to this question.

How frequently do you review the scheme's common data?

Regardless of whether you answer 'Yes' or 'No' to the above, we will ask a follow-up question about how often you conduct a data review exercise of your common data. The frequency options are provided for you. Answer 'On an infrequent basis when needed' if any of the following statements are true:

You only conduct a review exercise if you feel there is a need - this could be triggered by other events, for example a change in administrator
You never conduct a data review exercise

When did you last measure the scheme's common data?

You should provide us with the month and year of when common data was last measured for your scheme. This information may be in administration reports or can be provided by your scheme administrator. You can find out more about measuring your data in the section of our record-keeping guidance on reviewing scheme data.

What is the scheme's common data score?

You should ensure that the score you submit is a true reflection of the quality of your member data. Your data score is the percentage of members in the scheme that you hold complete and accurate data for.

As you may need different data items for your members depending on the benefit type (defined benefit or defined contribution) or member status (active, deferred or pensioner), you may wish to segregate your members to test the different groups against the relevant data items. This will help prevent false negatives from being included in your scores. You will then need to combine these scores to provide a single overall score for the scheme.

Example calculation

A data review of a scheme with 100 members shows that 40 addresses are missing but the rest of the data is present and accurate. The common data score is 60% as 60 members have full and accurate common data.

Scheme specific data

In addition to common data, you will need to hold scheme specific data. Scheme specific data is information about members’ participation in a scheme which is key for its effective operation and ensures members have good outcomes and experience. The data you need will depend on the:

nature of the benefits provided
member status
applicable legislation for your scheme
strategic goals

You should work with your administrator to assess and decide which data items are essential to the operation of the scheme and why these are critical.

More information about scheme-specific data and details of the legal requirements for PSPS can be found in our scheme member data quality guidance.

Have you measured the scheme specific data in the last 12 months?

You should confirm whether you have measured the scheme specific data in the last 12 months. The last 12 months is defined as the calendar year prior to the completion date of this current scheme return, which can be found on the Scheme Options page when selecting 'Complete scheme return'.

If you answer 'No' to this question you will be asked a follow-up question about whether you have assessed the need to review the common data or not.

If you answer 'Yes' to this question you will be asked to input the scheme specific data score and the date the scheme specific data was last measured.

Have you assessed the need for a data review exercise on the scheme specific data in the last 12 months?

This includes where you've considered the need to review this data as part of a wider data exercise, for example as part of a derisking project or while preparing for a change in administrator. You can answer 'Yes' or 'No' to this question.

How frequently do you review the scheme specific data?

Regardless of whether you answer 'Yes' or 'No' to the above, we will ask a follow-up questions about how often you conduct a data review exercise of your scheme specific data. The frequency options are provided for you. Answer 'On an infrequent basis when needed' if any of the following statements are true:

You only conduct a data review exercise if you feel there is a need - this could be triggered by other events, for example a change in administrator
You never conduct a data review exercise

When did you last measure the scheme specific data?

You should provide us with the month and year of when scheme specific data was last measured for your scheme. This information may be in administration reports or can be provided by your scheme administrator. You can find out more about measuring your data in the section of our record-keeping guidance on reviewing scheme data.

What is the scheme specific data score?

You should provide us with the percentage of members in your scheme for whom you have assessed the scheme specific data to be both complete and accurate for at the date provided above. You may exclude DB AVC benefits for the purpose of this question.

This information may be in administration reports or can be provided by your scheme administrator. In most cases you should be able to report based on your current processes.

Example calculation

Example one

If a data review of a scheme with 100 members shows that 40 members have at least one scheme-specific data item missing, the scheme-specific data score is also 60%.

Example two

A scheme has 100 members, of which 60 members are active members and 40 members are pensioners. Different data items are included in the scheme’s specific data for active and pensioner members.

To ensure that the data score provides an accurate reflection of data quality for the whole membership, the administrator calculates the scores separately for active and pensioner members, and then combines the individual scores. The data score for active members is 50% and the data score for pensioner members is 75%. 50%*[60/(40+60)] + 75%*[40/(40+60)] = 60%. The overall scheme score would therefore be 60%.

Example three

A hybrid scheme has 100 members, of which 60 members have defined benefits and 40 members have money purchase benefits. The data score for members with defined benefits is 50% and the data score for members with money purchase benefits is 75%. 50%*[60/(40+60)] + 75%*[40/(40+60)] = 60%. The overall scheme score would therefore be 60%.

Example four

A hybrid scheme has 100 members, of which 60 members have defined benefits and 80 members have money purchase benefits. The data score for members with defined benefits is 50% and the data score for members with money purchase benefits is 75%. 50%*[60/(80+60)] + 75%*[80/(80+60)] = 64%. The overall scheme score would therefore be 64%.