There have been several calls recently from some in the industry for a return to mandatory SSAS professional administrators or professional trustees. SSAS Practitioner.com Limited are strongly opposed to this. Our company was set up almost four years ago in response to criticism by many company directors of the high fees charged by some SSAS providers acting as professional trustees and administrators. Our clients are prepared to take on the responsibility of being a scheme administrator, albeit with professional help and guidance, such as that provided by a practitioner company charging much lower fees. This has proved to be a popular innovation, as evidenced by our rapid growth.
Our experience is that clients who abuse the rules are extremely rare. We go to considerable lengths to ensure that our clients are suited to SSASs by ensuring they are recommended to use SSASs by specialist IFAs, and by rigorously vetting all potential investments. The vast majority of our clients are more than capable of acting properly as sole trustees of their own schemes, particularly with some help and guidance.
We accept that some SSASs may fail to abide by the rules. If this means a small amount of extra regulation, so be it. If it also means that it becomes mandatory for all SSASs to have some professional contact we could reluctantly support that, even if we might stand accused of the sort of self-interest that is the basis of the calls for professional trustees and administrators for SSASs. We would prefer that SSAS holders continue to be allowed the opportunity to run their own schemes independently (the numbers doing so are very small), albeit in the clear knowledge that any infringements of the rules could lead to serious tax penalties. Otherwise, what would be next? Tax payers not being allowed to file tax and VAT returns without employing an accountant?
Let us be clear. Any return to the mandatory use of professional administrators or trustees would inevitably produce winners and losers. The winners would be the trustee companies who would undoubtably regain some reluctant clients. The losers would be those hard-working company directors, who would struggle to pay the resultant higher fees.
