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Employer Knowledge Article

EPN 750 - 2025/26 Annual Assurance Statements (AAS) exercise

Audience

  • Accounting Officers

  • Chief Executive Officers

  • Finance Directors

  • Finance Managers

  • Pension leads

Summary

  • This EPN provides information about this year’s Annual Assurance Statement (AAS) process.

  • Every participating Civil Service employer of the Civil Service Pension scheme (“the Scheme”) must ensure that they carry out their responsibilities in relation to the administration of the scheme. You can find these responsibilities in the Participation or Admission Agreement, which employers must sign.

  • Both Civil Service and New Fair Deal employers must complete the Annual Assurance Statement (AAS). If you are a Civil Service employer, your Accounting Officer (AO) must complete the AAS. If you are a New Fair Deal employer, your Chief Executive Officer (CEO) must complete the AAS.

  • The AAS helps the Civil Service Pension Scheme’s AO conduct their obligations to the Scheme, as outlined below.

  • To ensure that the internal controls and operational processes of participating employers are robust and conducted in accordance with participation and admission agreements.

  • To confirm that your AO (if you are a Civil Service employer) or CEO (if you are a New Fair Deal employer) has undertaken the following obligations to the Scheme with appropriate care and due diligence:

    • to remind employers of their role and responsibilities in relation to the Scheme; and

    • to highlight areas of risk, where we would expect employers to focus their assurance.

  • We do not intend for the AAS to either provide a detailed assessment of process performance, nor duplicate reporting conducted elsewhere.

Detail

We will shortly be issuing the 2025/26 AAS to the individual(s) responsible for completing your organisation’s AAS, in accordance with our records. The steps below explain how to complete the AAS.

  1. Add your organisation’s legally registered name to the AAS questionnaire. If your return includes any additional Civil Service agencies or Non Departmental Public Body (NDPBs), please add their legally registered name(s).

  2. You can find further assistance on answering the questions in the AAS FAQs.

  3. Complete the Declaration section of the AAS - your organisation’s AO (if you are a Civil Service employer) or CEO (if you are a New Fair Deal employer) will need to do this.

  4. Sign the Declaration section with an electronic signature. (Please include an email from your CEO/AO to show they have agreed to the contents of the questionnaire).

  5. Send the signed Declaration electronically, along with the completed AAS to AAS2026@civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk.

When submitting your AAS, please note:

  • We will not accept an incomplete AAS.

  • We will mark your AAS as late if you provide it after Friday 12 September 2026.

  • You must include your organisation’s name in the AAS and Declaration file names

If you have not received your AAS by Monday, 3rd of August, please email the AAS2026 mailbox. The Scheme Administrator at the time of this EPN (Capita) is responsible for issuing and managing AAS returns to enable us to focus on analysing the results and related actions arising from the submission of assurances.

Update to this year's process

  • We'll mark your AAS as late if you provide it after Friday 12 September 2026.

  • We'll be requesting details of any known large-scale pieces of work which departments may be planning over 2026/27.

  • We've expanded on the question regarding submission of interface files, given the issues that Capita are experiencing processing these currently.

  • We're continuing to accept the digital completion of the AAS to support employers’ flexible working practices.

  • We've included specific guidance for each question in the FAQs on the Civil Service Pension Scheme website.

If after reading the FAQs, you have any questions about this year’s AAS process, please email the AAS2026@civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk mailbox

Contacts

If you have a question about the distribution of EPNs or you need to receive them in a different format, please contact us.

You can find all current EPNs and forms on our website www.civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk under ‘Employers’.  

Historic EPNs

All EPNs prior to EPN635 have been archived. You can find these on the national archive website. You will need to scroll down to the EPN section to find the archived notices.

This notice is for employers and should not be issued to scheme members. 

If members have a question about their pension, they can find information at: www.civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk