Pensions in private schools: TPS withdrawal

[Elthamjohn]

Has anyone gone through this? I am really worried that my school might be about to leave the TPS, and I just don’t know where to begin…

Would they offer an alternative? What have other schools done? How do you understand what a good deal is compared to the TPS?

It will be about pay if we do. I think the mood might be in favour of industrial action, but it takes a long time to set it up.

Pay, rather than pensions? Interesting.

We’ve now been asked to vote on whether we accept the lower pay rise for those sticking with TPS. I suspect most people will agree. I’ve voted no. Will update.

How has your vote gone @Notellinganyone

As I understand it, if you come out of TPS you will still get whatever you are entitled to from the years you contributed, you don't just lose it. Only that you would stop contributing. Aviva has a special pension plan dedicated to Independent Schools called APTIS which they'd probably suggest. There should be a consultation process and you should involve the union. In a school I know they reached an agreement with the option to stay on TPS but with a pay cut to fund the difference or come out, each teacher could choose. Good luck!

So what did the board member expect you were planning to live on??

If you're not an active member TPS grows at a lower rate. Mine would be worth approx £2k pa less. Then the DC scheme would be a gamble. Assuming a 5% growth on the % we've been offered, over the time I have left that would generate around £5k pa less than TPS.

@Idontwannawaitinvain I think that the kind of high net worth individuals who might sit on the board of an independent school probably have a range of investments and are rather out of touch with how the other "half" (well, 95%) live. If you have two kids at a school like that it means you have around £50k each year available in post tax income doesn't it?

I suspect that there’s a touch of jealousy from these individuals, too @Phineyj

How dare this grubby, second-rate profession have a better pension than me?, sort of thing.

They don’t realise that many of us were fully conscious of the value of the TPS when we embarked on a teaching career.

@Elthamjohn that's exactly it. We were told by a governor that parents have pensions with far lower contribution rates and so won't have any sympathy for us. We have a large number of NHS professionals in our parent body who I suspect may be very sympathetic to our cause.

Lots of schools have issued the same silly paragraph to staff about how FTSE 100 companies offer a lower employer contribution to DC pensions.

Where do you start with pointing out the difference between FTSE 100 companies and teachers? So insulting.

@Elthamjohn - they’ve upped it to 1.75. I suspect this will be agreed.

That is very poor @Notellinganyone

Has your pay kept up with inflation / fee rises / the rest of the public sector in recent years?

Sorry, think I've missed a bit and am confused.

You can stay in TPS if you accept a pay rise of 1.75%? What's the offer if you leave TPS?

Can you explain? Lots of professionals in large listed companies, many earning much the same as teachers

@LittleBearPad I’m afraid that I can’t find the median salary for a graduate + post-graduate qualification + x number of years’ experience in a FTSE 100 company. Although ONS stats indicate that average private sector income has increased in line with inflation.

However, I find the comparison virtually impossible to make on public sector terms and conditions. You can compare teacher remuneration with the civil service more clearly, perhaps, but, really, governors should be looking for salaries to keep up with or be competitive with the maintained sector. Private schools don’t actively recruit from FTSE 100 companies.

I mentioned this in another thread last week but there we go - another one is at it. I have it on good authoutity that "good projections of pension incomes with broadly comparable benefits" mean about £6-15k less per year for most of the staff when they retire.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj56mgr126no

Yes, we calculated £10k less a year for a typical female teacher who's had a maternity leave and worked part time for some of her career. So in that range.

There's a gender pay gap in pensions as well as pay.

I saw the other thread, @BigBananaBox. The Dame Allan's offer isn't only bad compared to the TPS, crucially it's bad compared to every other indie in the region. I gather that governors have started resigning (but haven't verified that myself).

@Sewingmachine1 - we balloted to strike a while ago and stayed in TPS. School has also introduced voluntary parallel pension scheme which, unsurprisingly, hardly anyone has opted for. With the rise in employer contributions on horizon they have offered 1.75 to TPS members and 4.5 to those in, or who choose to join, the other scheme.

From what I know the Chair of Governors stood down but is still on the board but one governor resigned on the day the final fire and rehire letter was sent to staff, which just may be a coincidence...........🤔or he may be the one with the conscience. I suspect we'll never know. https://www.thegazette.co.uk/company/04002372/filing-history/MzQxMzI2NTI0MGFkaXF6a2N4

I have never come across a teacher who moved from the Independent sector to the state sector and was a better teacher than those the state school already had. They have invariably needed significant amounts of support to manage classes, to manage behaviour effectively, to cope with class sizes, workload, understand how to plan for the numbers and types of SEN issues, to adapt to less able students, and to deal with the stress and pressure of a state school. It's another world. Just very, very different. Longer terms, shorter holidays too in state schools.
Not many do move to state schools successfully.
Not many move from state schools to independent schools either.

Well, I've done both and it's been fine (after an initial adjustment period). Teachers are teachers. Schools are schools. Kids are kids.

I've been pleasantly surprised by the ability and energy of the state school students.

Not all independent school students are super brainy. Sometimes parents are paying fees for a reason...

The only real surprise I had was that study leave for GCSE and A-level isn't really a thing any more.

Me, too. I have basically done half my career in the maintained sector and half in the independent sector and, if I might say, do a very good job in both.

I actually work in the independent for now and am seconded to a school in the state sector once a week.

There is far more movement between sectors these days. I am grateful for what both experiences give me as a teacher and being experienced in both is also what will give me longevity in my career (I hope).

I'm late to this thread, and have only read the op's posts, so apologies if this has already been said, but I wouldn't worry about the TPS being dropped from state schools, whether academies or not. It would result in national strike action, and recruitment is difficult enough as it is.

Academies are well aware of the need to compete with maintained schools for staff so they tend to have the same or even slightly better T&C's.

There would also be no logic in ending TPS without ending other state-sponsored defined benefit schemes too - e.g. civil service, NHS. Can you imagine the fallout?