KiwiSaver

Labour has floated the idea of forcing KiwiSavers to keep their money in New Zealand, as well as making the scheme compulsory.

Labour’s finance spokesman David Parker raised the possibility of preventing KiwiSaver funds being moved overseas in an interview on TV3 programme The Nation on the weekend.

He mentioned it as an option, while reiterating Labour’s election policies of compulsory KiwiSaver, a capital gains tax and a gradual increase in the retirement age.

“On the savings front, we’re going to have to consider whether we make our savings sticky, rather than having open borders – people being able to take their savings pool with them to Australia,” Parker said.

“Someone suggested to me the other day – a senior business person – that we’re going to actually have to have a closed system that says once you get universal savings you actually can’t take them with you to Australia,” he said.

“We’ve got such a problem now between income differentials between New Zealand and Australia that we’re going to have to do better. We’re actually also going to have to move on inequality, you know, inequality in New Zealand is rising to atrocious levels, and a capital gains tax helps fix that as well.”

New Zealanders who move overseas are currently allowed to apply to pull their money out of KiwiSaver, except for government tax credits; however, there is a minimum 12-month wait before they get their money.

Those moving to Australia – where saving is compulsory – should soon be able to transfer their funds to one of the super schemes over there, once Australia gets around to signing the Trans-Tasman Portability Agreement.

New Zealand signed the agreement in 2010.

The government’s decision to delay KiwiSaver auto-enrolment until the Budget is back in surplus has been criticised by default provider Mercer.

The Government announced at last year’s Budget that it planned to introduce auto-enrolment in 2014; however, at yesterday’s announcement of this year’s Budget it confirmed the plan had been put on hold.

“The Government said it would proceed when it had sufficient surpluses to meet the forecast cost of up to NZ$514 million over four years,” Finance Minister Bill English and Commerce Minister Craig Foss said in a press release.

“Proceeding with auto enrolment in 2014/15 is not now possible without putting the surplus at risk,” English said.

“Public consultation will now be deferred until after 2012 and the policy won’t be implemented until after 2014/15.”

Mercer New Zealand boss Martin Lewington welcomed the Government’s roadmap back to surplus but said he was concerned about its failure to address looming shortfalls in retirement savings.

“Mercer is disappointed the Government has deferred KiwiSaver auto-enrolment and will consult once the budget returns to surplus,” Lewington said.

The Government highlighted in the Budget that approximately 15,000 people are joining KiwiSaver every month, he said. 

“Clearly there is public support for the Scheme and the more people who are in KiwiSaver, the less reliance on the Government. Any deferment of auto-enrolment inevitably means there’s a group out there who will be missing the benefits of KiwiSaver,” Mr Lewington said.

“There is urgency to help New Zealanders recognise the benefits of building private savings today, to ensure a comfortable retirement tomorrow.”

Financial advisers are losing popularity as a source of information for KiwiSaver members, who prefer to go to product providers or their employers, according to new research.

The Mercer KiwiSaver Sentiment Index Study found only 19% of respondents preferred to go a financial adviser for information about the scheme, down from 23% in the last study in 2009 and 33% when the first study was conducted in 2007 just before KiwiSaver was launched.

Nearly half (49%) chose their KiwiSaver provider as a preferred source of information, while one in four respondents preferred to go to their employer or HR manager.

However, the latter figure is down from 48% in 2007 and 37% in 2009 (the numbers add up to more than 100% as respondents can choose more than one answer).

Financial advisers were just behind government sources such as the IRD (20%, down from 40% in 2009), slightly ahead of family (17%) and well ahead of the media, which only 5% of people chose as a preferred source.

Mercer’s Elyssia Silberstein, who oversaw the research, said respondents weren’t asked why they preferred a particular source.

“I would expect that there’s a lot more information and communication available now.  Financial advisers have been used in the past but with the government playing an active role [in providing information] perhaps the perceived need for financial advisers has diminished over time.”

Martin Lewington, head of Mercer New Zealand, noted that the drop-off had taken place at the same time the new regulatory regime for advisers was introduced.

“Hopefully in the 2014 survey KiwiSavers will have seen the benefits in the new regulatory environment and we will have seen an uptick in that.”

He noted that although 73% of respondents said in 2007 before the scheme’s launch that they planned to pick their own provider, in the latest survey only 58% had actually done so, with the rest allowing their decision to be made by the IRD or their employer.

The study also found opposition to KiwiSaver had increased, with 30% actively against it compared to 22% in 2009; those actively against it tended to be over 55, owned their own home and had children who weren’t enrolled in KiwiSaver.

Lewington said the increase in opposition had implications for the debate on whether to make the scheme compulsory.

Imposing more regulations on KiwiSaver funds could stifle the best performers, says Fidelity Life chief executive Milton Jennings.

Financial Markets Authority chief executive Sean Hughes said there were gaps in the rules relating to KiwiSaver schemes.

He says there should be more co-operation between regulators, and suggests “there is no prudential supervision for KiwiSaver.”

Prudential supervision assesses whether undue risks are being taken with investors’ money.

Jennings conceded the HuljichKiwiSaver saga – where investors were misled about the performance of the Huljich Wealth Management KiwiSaver fund – “certainly exposed a gap”.

But he said prudential supervision of KiwiSaver funds would be complicated.”Do you go down to [assessing] single stocks? It’s very hard.”

He said higher-risk funds could be a casualty of increased regulation, such as Fidelity’s Options fund, one of KiwiSaver’s top performers.

“We had noises from the regulators saying it’s too high risk for KiwiSaver…  there’s been volatility over the five year period, but it’s probably the top performing fund, so do you want to stop that type of investment?”

Milford Asset Management’s investment committee chairman Brian Gaynor said funds already outlined their investment stance in prospectuses.

“And you can see by the way directors are being prosecuted regarding prospectuses at the moment it’s a very powerful document in terms of the law.”

But he said there were two glaring gaps in KiwiSaver regulation that Hughes had not mentioned.

“The disclosure of fees is probably the weakest area, the second is probably consistency in how to measure and report returns and performances.”

He called for the establishment of a KiwiSaver comparison website, managed by a body such as the FMA.