Employer only contributing to pension?

[Hurricane4]

My employer is setting up a group pension scheme. When he asked if I was interested I said no as I am going on maternity leave soon and will be off work for a year after so no income.

Anyway he has said that he is going to make contributions for me from the company for the year I am off, which is great but I have never heard of this before - is this normal or are there any catches for when I return to work. Don't know much about pensions anyway.

Thanks in advance

 

[ClubMan]

Often (normally?) employers who contribute on behalf of an employee only do so on a matched basis - e.g. they will match employee contributions up to some capped percentage of gross. It's unusual, but presumably not unknown, for employers to (unilaterally and without preconditions regarding matching of contributions) to contribute as you described above. But are you sure that this is what they are doing? If they do this then there should be no catch other than if you leave the job/scheme before two years membership of the pension scheme then you will not be able to retain the benefits of the employer contributions (unless the scheme rules have a shorter vesting period than the statutory minimum of two years).

 

[Don_08]

There are a number of schemes where the employer will pay a minimum in, and then match whatever the employee puts in ( to a cap) on top of this minimum. So sounds like that type of scheme.

No catches - though if you leave within the two years you will get no benefit out of it.

Only thing is the contributions will be based on what you are being paid - so it will be likely you won;t get any contributions for unpaid leave.