UK – The £3.6bn (€5.25bn) Merseyside Pension Fund has re-awarded two actuarial and investment advice contracts to Mercer Human Resource Consulting following a competitive tendering process.

The briefs – running for six years - were re-awarded to Mercer to provide the scheme with basic actuarial valuation work, and to undertake asset/liability studies and asset allocation advice.

According to the Merseyside scheme’s pension and investment head John Parry, the competitive tendering process took roughly between four and five months. No external advisers were used in the process.

“There were a number of applicants, and Mercer came top of the list,” said Parry.

Five tenders were received for the actuarial brief. Mercer was awarded this contract for being “the most economically advantageous”.

Meanwhile, Mercer won the second brief for which there were four tenders, for “being the lowest price”.

The scheme stated Mercer is the only firm that provides the fund with actuarial services.

Meanwhile, Mercer said John Hawkins has joined its Retirement Financial Management team in London. He was previously head of finance and risk at Invensys plc.

Yesterday IPE reported that Mercer was considering bringing its new service for US frozen defined benefit pension plans to Europe.

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