The Surrey Local Firefighters' Pension Board met to discuss scheme management activities, review the action and recommendation tracker, and receive updates on various pension-related matters. The board reviewed and agreed to close several items on the action tracker and received updates on the McCloud remedy¹ and pensions dashboards². The meeting also included a verbal update from XPS, the scheme administrator.

Scheme Management Update

The board received an update on scheme management activities, including the McCloud remedy, annual benefit statements, and the 10% pensionable allowance.

• McCloud Remedy: XPS continues to issue statements to members, with over 96% of immediate choice members having received their Remedial Service Statements (RSS). The remaining cases are complex, awaiting technical guidance, or affected by the Matthews remedy. XPS aims to publish the remaining statements by the end of July.

• Annual Benefit Statements (ABS) / Remediable Service Statement (RSS): XPS has successfully published over 75% of ABSs. Additional data clarification has been requested for the outstanding cases, with a target publication date of the end of July. A breach has been reported to The Pensions Regulator (tPR) regarding the statements.

• McCloud Remedy - Contingent Decisions: The Scheme Manager has received seven claims related to contingent decisions, which are being considered based on evidence provided by the member.

• Historic pension contribution issue: The pension team identified a historical pension contribution issue affecting approximately 20 members who were employed in both regular and retained roles prior to 2011. The issue has been resolved going forward, and the team is obtaining legal guidance to address the historical over-deductions.

• 10% Pensionable Allowance: The pensions team has obtained legal guidance regarding the timeline for completing the 10% pensionable allowance project. The legal view confirmed that the critical timeline involved payments due to members, and this part of the project has been successfully completed.

• Retained Settlement – Matthew's cases: The project continues to make good progress, with positive elections from over 50% of the total membership in scope. A tracing exercise has successfully traced individuals, and follow-up communications have been sent to encourage participation.

Finance Update on Surrey Firefighters' Pension Scheme

The board received a finance update on the Surrey Firefighters' Pension Scheme, which is administered by Surrey County Council. The scheme is unfunded, meaning that current costs are funded by current income. Employee and employer contributions, as well as transfer values, are paid into the pension fund, from which pension payments and other benefits are paid. The fund is topped up by a government grant. Rose Ellerton, Finance Business Partner, presented the update, which included information on reporting requirements, the McCloud/Matthews remedies, and the administration of the pension fund scheme.

XPS Update

Toby Clark, client relationship manager at XPS, provided a verbal update to the board, covering the Remedial Service Statements (RSS), pensions dashboards, and service delivery.

• Remedial Service Statements (RSS): Toby Clark reported that 96% of the Immediate Choice RSS have been completed. The financially affected will be the next ones that probably take the most priority with us. PSO ones we can't do at the moment because we're still waiting on guidance for those.

• Pensions Dashboards: Toby Clark said that XPS has connected 20 schemes so far since April, and they've all successfully connected as well. In terms of data cleanse, the obligation on the scheme manager is just around trying to make sure as many people match successfully first time as possible.

• New pension administration system: Toby Clark said that XPS is moving away from the Altair platform to their own system, called Aurora. He said that the team doing that transition is completely separate from the teams doing the day-to-day admin or doing the McLeod work as well, so that day-to-day service shouldn't be affected in any way.

Action and Recommendation Tracker

The board reviewed the action and recommendation tracker and agreed to close several items, including A-12-25 and A-13-25. Action A-14-25, which concerned a query over certain concerns, will be clarified through the XPS report.

Risk Register

The board considered the risk register, noting the success in closing the team resourcing risk and in reducing the Matthews risk. The Scheme Manager highlighted the 2023 / 2024 End of year return for XPS risk.

Fire Bulletins

The board reviewed fire bulletins 92, 93 and 94, which were released by the LGA. The Senior Pensions Advisor and Scheme Manager noted that much of the content of the fire bulletins had been fed into the Scheme Manager report.

Other Matters

• The date of the next meeting was confirmed as 20 November 2025.
• Sharon Stoker provided an update on the Matthews project figures, noting that 73 members had been identified, with 21 having made a choice and 52 outstanding members who have not made a choice at present.
• Danny Lamanias requested an update for the next meeting to ensure it is received ahead of the next board meeting.
• The board discussed the new Internal Dispute Resolution Procedure Policy (IDRP), which has been redrafted to ensure alignment with the Surrey County Council (SCC) Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) IDRP policy.
• The board discussed training for the Pensions Team and Pension Board members, including a Local Government Association (LGA) training session in May 2025 and a formal qualification for the Pensions Officer and Pensions Assistant.
• The board discussed the progress made on the pensions dashboard, with a 90.16% match on all data reached.
• The board discussed automatic enrolment into pension schemes, as required by the Pensions Act 2008³.