Business Services Organisation
This newsletter is for all general practitioners (GPs) who are members of the HSC Pension Scheme. This communication will include all relevant updates and procedures regarding the administration of principal, salaried and locum GPs. Please read carefully and retain for future reference.
Principal and salaried GP’s should use gpcertificates@hscni.net mail box.
Locum GPs should use GPLocums@hscni.net mail box.
This newsletter contains information about:
- Payment on Account (POA) 2026/27
- Annual Certificate of Pensionable Profit 2024/25
- Self-Assessment of Tiered Contributions
- Timeline for completion of various Pension related processed for Salaried GPs/Stand-Alone OOH GPs
- Email Queries
- Opting In and Out of HSC Pension Scheme Membership
- Engage
- Submission of Pension Applications – McCloud Ruling
- Contact us
-
Payment on Account (POA) 2026/27
The Payment on Account (POA) 2026/27 was recently sent to Practice Managers and Accountants. If you have not yet submitted your Payment on Account Form for 2026/27 please do so as soon as possible, the link to the form can be found at Principal GPs | HSC Pension Service
In the event that we do not have a new submission for year 2026/27 we will continue to deduct the amount we deducted in March 2026. However, it is important that forms are submitted to ensure we deduct contributions as accurately as possible and eliminate large underpayments of contributions.
Any amendments to the Payment on Account throughout the year should be emailed to gpcertificates@hscni.net
All queries regarding funding should be forwarded to SPPG.
This would be the ideal time to make any changes to your seniority claim if necessary e.g. change in pensionable profit that will impact on your seniority entitlement. Practices should contact BSO on gms.claims@hscni.net and insert ‘Seniority Adjustment’ in the subject line.
-
Annual Certificate of Pensionable Profit 2024/25
We are currently processing any 2024/25 Annual Certificates of Pensionable Profit which have been submitted.
The deadline for submitting the Annual Certificate of Pensionable Profit 2024/25 was 28th February 2026. At this date we had received 75% of the certificates due.
The Northern Ireland average profit for seniority purposes is as follows:
0% – earnings below £33,727.19
60% – earnings above £33,727.20 below £67,454.39
100% – earnings above £67,454.40
If you have not yet submitted your Annual Certificate of Pensionable Profit 2024/25 please do so as soon as possible. All returns should be sent to gpcertificates@hscni.net
-
Self-Assessment of Tiered Contributions
A reminder for any Salaried GPs, OOH Stand-Alone GPs and Locum GPs that the 2025/26 Self- Assessment of Tiered Contributions Form is available on our website for completion, the link to the form can be Salaried GPs | HSC Pension Service
The team continue to work through the Self-Assessment Forms and will contact you when the reconciliation process has been completed.
The production of Annual Benefit Statements (ABS) and Annual Allowance (AA) data will then follow in due course.
-
Timeline for completion of various Pension related processed for Salaried GPs/Stand-Alone OOH GPs
Practice managers should submit as soon as possible after 31st March 2026 the 2025/26 SR2 Form for any Salaried GPs in the Practice. We will complete the reconciliation and set any adjustments once SR2 Form has been processed.
The 2025/26 SR2 Form is available here Salaried GPs | HSC Pension Service
We will receive information from Payroll Shared Services for Out of Hours Sessional and Salaried GPs Pensionable Pay information for year-end 31/03/2026 in due course.
All Assistant Practitioners should complete a Self-Assessment of Tiered Contributions Certificate for 2025/26. The certificate together with guidance notes will soon be available at Salaried GPs | HSC Pension Service
-
Email Queries
The GP Certificates Inbox (gpcertificates@hscni.net) receives a high volume of emails on a daily basis.
When contacting the practitioner section via email can you please include as much information as possible in your query so we can answer your query quickly and efficiently.
Please include part of your National Insurance number and date of birth so we can access your Pension Record and provide you with the required information. Failure to provide this information will result in HSC Pension Service contacting you for this information which will delay how quickly and effectively we can respond to your query.
-
Opting In and Out of HSC Pension Scheme Membership
Members can ‘opt out’ of HSC Pension Scheme membership at any time. Please remember GPs must either pension all of their practitioner employments or none of their practitioner employments. Members must notify all of their employing authorities, not just HSC Pension Service. GPs can pension their practitioner employments but ‘opt out’ of officer employments or vice versa.
Form SD502 is available on our website at SD502, members are reminded to read the Guidance Notes before deciding to ‘opt out’ of the HSC Pension Scheme. GPs opting out in year should utilise any overlap profits in that year’s annual certificate. We record the date of ‘opt out’ on the pension record.
If a member decides to ‘opt in’ again we require form SS14 Start of Pensionable Employment to be completed. This is the only way we can continue to update your pension record so that the accurate status of your scheme membership is recorded.
-
Engage
Member self service has now been upgraded to “Engage”. The new Pension portal allows users to see all of their Pension information regarding their accrued benefits with all of their HSCNI employments.
The new system is easier to navigate, and brings all annual benefits statements together to view in one section.
The new system also has significantly improved security, and now requires users to set up “2 factor authentication” – this is done by the user entering their mobile phone number and receiving a code via text message when they log in.
As a result of the upgraded security, all previous login credentials are not compatible with the new system, which means anyone who previously signed up before 26/02/2026 will need to sign up again on the new Engage platform.
Any member who actively works for a HSCNI trust or regional Org, such as BSO or NIMTDA, that is assigned a trust email from that employer, must use that email to log in—if they do not use it, it will be automatically updated each month by that employer on our system—we cannot stop this process.
If a member only works within your directional employment, they will be shown the email address that was last given to us by their employer through the GP55a process.
All users should now be directed to the registration “create a new account” page to set up a new account—ALL previous login details are no longer valid—members cannot request password resets and username reminders unless the sign up again
Create a new account – HSC Pension Fund
Once a member has created their new account, they can login from the normal login page
The main Engage section of our website contains helpful videos for members to familiarise themselves with using and navigating Engage.
-
Submission of Pension Applications - McCloud Ruling
Members can ‘opt out’ of HSC Pension Scheme membership at any time. Please remember GPs must either pension all of their practitioner employments or none of their practitioner employments. Members must notify all of their employing authorities, not just HSC Pension Service. GPs can pension their practitioner employments but ‘opt out’ of officer employments or vice versa.
Form SD502 is available on our website at SD502, members are reminded to read the Guidance Notes before deciding to ‘opt out’ of the HSC Pension Scheme. GPs opting out in year should utilise any overlap profits in that year’s annual certificate. We record the date of ‘opt out’ on the pension record.
If a member decides to ‘opt in’ again we require form SS14 Start of Pensionable Employment to be completed. This is the only way we can continue to update your pension record so that the accurate status of your scheme membership is recorded.
-
Contact Us
By Post:
GP Certificates
HSC Pension Service
Orchard House
40 Foyle Street
Derry/Londonderry
BT48 6ATVia e-mail: GPCertificates@hscni.net or GPlocums@hscni.net
Please do not send any returns to individual team members email accounts.
By Telephone: 028 7131 9111 option 3.
10.00 am to 12.00pm / 2.00 pm to 4.00pm – Monday to Thursday
10.00 am to 12.00pm – FridayFind us on Twitter – @hscpensions
Find us on Facebook – HSC Pension ServiceEmployer Technical Updates are available here.
All Newsletters produced this quarter are available on our website here.