Employer hasn't deducted my pension contributions for 2 months - should I tell them?

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flossie

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My emplyer currently contributes 8% to my pension, with me adding a further 7% (to bring it to the maximum 15%). Recently, I was changed over from a PRSA to a defined contribution scheme. I thought i had a coupe of extra € in my pay packet thi smonth, but didn't think too much of it.

For some reason the company that deals with our salaries (I work for a US company, large financial company in Ireland are employed to sort out salary/tax etc.) didn't send out our pay slips, so i requested that they be sent. Received it the other day and notice that my personal contribution has not been deducted. The 8% emplyer contribution has. Looked at my salary slip from last month and see the same happened also (didn't notice it as i got a fairly decent bonus).

Question is, am I obliged to tell my company? At the moment, cash flow has been tight due to some unforseen events, so if I am honest the extra few hundred is appreciated. If I contact my company say in February, can they make me add in my contributions to the fund? I am eager to keep up my contributions as I know the importance of having a decent pension fund in place, but don't want to be hit with a demand from my company for say €1500 in a couple of months (or if I am, could I arrange to pay this in monthly installments?).

I am guessing that where the PRSA was transferred to a DC scheme there was some confusion somewhere.
 
You should not receive a "demand" for the "missing" personal contributions unless there is some requirement that you make a minimum contribution in order to benefit from the employer contribution of 8%. One way or another you should draw this matter to your employer's attention as it's a mistake on their part with payroll. And it's always possible that it's not the only one (I speak from experience here with several different employers and payroll service providers!). If there is no onus on you to match employer contributions to any level and you need cash in hand right now then that should be fine. And maybe you need to scale back your pension contributions for a while if you need more cash on an ongoing basis? What's best for your situation really depends on the specifics of your circumstances so it's difficult to comment with any further authority.
 
As an aside, you should also contact the pension company to establish if Employer and/or Employee contributions have been remitted on your behalf. Just because no deductions have been made from your salary, it doesn't automatically follow that the money hasn't been sent to the pension company. Often this is done by Direct Debit from the employer's bank account.
 
Update

Took a full look over my pay slips and it appears I was wrong.

My pension was always showing up as 'PRSA CB' with amount deducted beside it. This is now showing as '0'. A new line has appeared saying 'Pension CB'- with debit of €440. How i missed it I don't know!

Previous payslip was the same. Sorry! Thanks for the responses though.
 
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