(This archived guidance relates to HMRC discretionary
practice before the 6th April 2006. For current guidance on
Registered Pension Schemes see the Registered Pension Schemes
Manual)
The person responsible for submitting the information required in Part II of the Regulations and the person against whom penalties will be sought in cases of non-compliance, is the scheme administrator, ie the l egal administrator as now defined in Section 611AA ICTA 1988. If there is no administrator or the administrator cannot be traced, it is the person who is responsible for the administrator's duties at the time the penalty procedure commences (Section 606 ICTA 1988 refers). The information on the approval application form may not be very reliable as some practitioners may attach a different meaning to the term administrator. (It is common for practitioners who carry out the day to day administration of a scheme to refer to themselves as the administrator but in fact they are often not the l egal administrator. They sometimes are, but it is far more common for either the "principal employer" or "the trustees" to be the legal administrator.) You should therefore first check the scheme documentation to verify the name and address of the administrator. If the administrator is not identified in recent documentation you must telephone the practitioner to confirm that the person(s) named on the approval application form is in fact the legal administrator or to provide the correct name(s) and address(es).
