A third of women miss out on new pension legislation

A third of working women will miss out on rules that were meant to guarantee them a pension. The auto-enrolment legislation was meant to make sure that the vast majority of people in work would be automatically put into their employer's pension scheme. However, new figures have revealed that a third of women will miss out.

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The research, by the Pensions Policy Institute for Age UK, found that a third of women in work will not be automatically enrolled in a workplace pension, because they don't qualify for it. This compares with just 16% of working men.

The most popular reason is because they don't earn enough - and are on less than £10,000 a year. Women are far more likely to fall into this group, because not only are they paid less than men, they are also more likely to have caring responsibilities that mean they work part time, or in a number of part time jobs.

Caroline Abrahams, Charity Director at Age UK is calling for a lower threshold to bring more people into the rules.

Tip of the iceberg

It's also worth bearing in mind that this study is only looking at those who are traditionally employed - and around half of all people aged between 16 and 64 aren't.

Women are more likely to be out of work - particularly when they have a young family. Those looking for work/life balance are also more likely to be self-employed - which leaves them outside the legislation.

This is why so many women are heading for a disaster in retirement. Separate research from Aegon UK found that more than half of women don't expect a company pension to be a cornerstone of their retirement income.

Partly as a result of this, just 5% of women are on track for the retirement they would like, and less than a third are confident they will be able to afford to retire when they like.

What will your retirement income be?

Angela Seymour-Jackson, Managing Director of Workplace at Aegon UK said: "Women have a very specific set of challenges when it comes to financially preparing for retirement. Despite the Government implementing significant changes in the past year to empower people, we are still just at the starting point. We need to shift the focus to those who aren't saving and address specific needs, such as those of women. This includes enabling women to save as much as possible, when it matters, to better equip them for the future."

Women aren't the only ones to be left behind by the legislation. The research also found that 81% of workers receiving Carer's Allowance do not qualify for automatic enrolment, while 30% of disabled workers are not eligible, only 55% of those working in the service industries qualify, and ethnic minority groups are also less likely to meet the qualifying criteria. For example, about a third of Pakistani and Bangladeshi workers are not eligible.

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