U.K. Pensions Minister Steve Webb said the fees that defined contribution plan providers will be allowed to charge on the default fund in new auto-enrollment plans will be capped at 0.75%.
The U.K. is currently rolling out a system under which all employees are signed up for retirement plans unless they opt out. It's expected to affect 10 million people. Mr. Webb set out new rules Thursday for the charges such funds can levy, which he said would cost the industry about £200 million ($332 million) over the next decade.
The announcement came after Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne used his March 19 budget statement to remove rules restricting how retirees are allowed to spend their retirement assets, removing the requirement to buy an annuity.
“We are going to put charges in a vice and we will tighten the pressure, year after year,” Mr. Webb told Parliament. “This is a full-frontal assault on poor value for money from a government that is on the side of those people who save.”
In 2017, the government will look at lowering the cap on fees and making it include transaction costs, Mr. Webb said. Funds are also to be prevented from increasing fees to participants who have switched jobs and so are no longer contributing to the plan.