Heineken UK toasts new pension plan with PQM PLUS

Heineken UK has been awarded the top mark of excellence - Pension Quality Mark (PQM) PLUS - for its new Defined Contribution (DC) pension plan.

Heineken has developed the new plan to provide its 2,300 UK employees with a high quality pension arrangement for their future service.

From an early stage, the company worked closely with the PQM team and the plan provider, Standard Life, to ensure that the plan’s design, communications and governance met exacting standards.

PQM PLUS is the highest standard that can be attained through PQM.  It is awarded to employers who provide their employees with high quality DC pension schemes. Under PQM PLUS, the scheme’s total contributions must equal at least 15 per cent of an employee’s salary, with a minimum employer contribution of 10 per cent.

Commenting on the award, Robin Pring, HR Director at Heineken UK, said:

“We have taken great care to ensure that our new pension plan has been designed and implemented to the highest standards, and that it is valued by our colleagues.

“We are therefore delighted that it has been recognised with this important quality award."

Joanne Segars, Chief Executive at the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) which launched the PQM initiative, said:

“We are very pleased that Heineken has been awarded PQM PLUS.

“Employers increasingly recognise the importance of providing good pensions to their staff and view PQM as the symbol of a quality pension.

“We are impressed to see that employers like Heineken are taking this a step further by expressly developing pensions to match the PQM standard.”

The Pension Quality Mark (PQM) was launched by the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) in September 2009. Over 110 schemes now qualify and approximately 200,000 active scheme members are now covered by schemes that carry the mark. There are two standards, PQM and PQM PLUS.

PQM is the basic standard. It recognises DC schemes whose total contributions are of at least 10 per cent, with a minimum employer contribution of 6 per cent.

Notes to editors:

1. For further details on the Pension Quality Mark & the Friend of the Pension Quality Mark initiative: http://www.pensionqualitymark.org.uk/ and http://www.pensionqualitymark.org.uk/friendofpqm.php
2. Heineken UK is the UK’s leading beer and cider producer, with a portfolio of instantly recognised brands including Heineken, Foster’s, Strongbow, Bulmers, John Smith’s and Kronenbourg 1664.  Its workforce of around 2,300 employees operates across 7 main sites, providing the capacity to produce over 1.2bn litres of beer and cider each year.  In addition the company manages over 1,200 pubs across the UK.
3. The NAPF is the leading voice of workplace pensions in the UK. We speak for 1,200 pension schemes with some 15 million members and assets of around £800 billion. NAPF members also include over 400 businesses providing essential services to the pensions sector. 

Contacts:

Paul Platt, Head of Media, NAPF, 020 7601 1717 or 07917506683, [email protected]

Christian Zarro, Press Officer, NAPF, 020 7601 1718 or 07825 171 446, [email protected]