CIMA General News

CIMA updates risk guidance on pensions

CIMA (The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants) has today issued an update to its guidance to organisations on how to manage the corporate risk of pension schemes. ‘The pension liability - managing the corporate risk’ was successfully launched in November 2006 and our new version can be downloaded for free at http://www.cimaglobal.com/pensions.

The revised guidance and checklist contain the latest statistics and examples along with changes to regulation that have occurred since the original guidance was launched. These include references to the pension regulator’s revised ‘clearance guidance’, the recently launched ASB discussion paper ‘The financial reporting of pensions’, scheme specific valuation and the International Financial Reporting Interpretations Committee (IFRIC) Statement D14.

The report takes a different approach from most other pension guidance by tackling pension risk from a corporate point of view. The publication has benefited from oversight by the CIMA Pensions Advisory Group, whose members include finance directors from FTSE100 and FTSE250 companies, leading academics, along with trustees of some of the UK’s major pension funds.

The guidance offers CFOs and FDs an outline of the current regulatory framework, the potential risks from the pension liability and how to understand and better manage these risks. The checklist aims to assist companies in producing a tailored action plan for effective corporate risk management.