UK – At least 25,000 British companies are not providing an employee pension scheme, according to research by AXA Sunlife, UK operating arm of French insurer AXA.

The outcome of a survey of 400 medium-to-large companies across the UK reveals that 25% of companies employing between 11 and 25 people do not have a pension scheme.

For those companies employing between 26 and 100, this figure was 12%, and 5% for those with over 101 employees. Companies employing more than five people are required by law to provide a pension scheme for staff.

Of those companies that provide schemes, 71% offer a defined contribution scheme, while only 20% have a final salary scheme.

Steve Folkard, head of pensions marketing at AXA, said: “This is a major issue requiring urgent action. It seems that companies of all sizes are unaware of their legal responsibility to provide access to a pension scheme for their staff.”

AXA is currently trying to position itself among the top five players in the UK corporate pension scheme market. November last year it set up a new specialist unit to provide large schemes with a range of support services designed to let firms keep running costs down.

The investment management of the schemes that AXA-Sunlife takes on are implemented by AXA Investment Managers, AXA Rosenberg or through AXA Sunlife’s external links.

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