About membership

Whatever your age and length of service, the Scheme is important to you and can provide valuable benefits. The following pages tell you about the range of benefits provided by the Scheme.

You can join the Scheme if you are:

Membership of the Scheme costs 5% of your pensionable salary – but you get tax relief on your contributions at the highest rate of tax you pay.

Your contributions help to provide a pension for yourself when you retire, and a pension for your spouse or dependant in the event of your death.

Your employer also contributes into the Scheme on your behalf. The Scheme is what’s called a ‘balance of cost’ arrangement, which means that the employers contribute whatever else is necessary in order to provide the promised level of benefits. Currently, the employers contribute 24.4% of pensionable salary for members with a normal retirement age of 60 and 13.1% for members with a normal retirement age of 65. The employers pay additional contributions aimed at removing the deficit in the Scheme. These amounts are reviewed every three years and can go up or down, depending on the funding level of the Scheme and other economic and demographic circumstances.