Expertise

Nicola Severn is a Managing Associate in Addleshaw Goddard's pensions department, having qualified into the department in 2011.  

Nicola has a wide practice, advising both pension scheme trustees and sponsoring employers on a wide range of pensions law matters, including automatic enrolment, closing defined benefit schemes, scheme amendments, interpretation of rules (including indexation provisions in light of the government's change from RPI to CPI), internal dispute resolution and governance.  She also has a large amount of experience assisting on transactions and other projects in both the private and public sectors, and heads up the pensions department's local government and public sector pensions practice.  

Her experience includes:

• Advising the trustee of a sectionalised multi-employer pension scheme on a wide range of both day to day issues and large projects, including bulk transfers in and out, a change of administrator, changing the corporate trustee to a different corporate structure, section buy-ins and buy-outs, and liaising with the Pensions Regulator and the Pension Protection Fund when a sponsoring employer went into a CVA and subsequent liquidation.  
• Advising trustee and employer clients of the pensions requirements of GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.  
• Employer advisory work on significant scheme change projects such as closing defined benefit schemes and setting up defined contribution arrangements.  
• Transactional support involving issues such as TUPE transfers, Beckmann rights, mismatched employees, apportionment of employer debt and matters specific to high earning employees. 
• Advising on outsourcings from local councils, acting for both authorities and contractors (including in relation to admission agreements and bonds).
• Advising on a variety of other transactions and projects across the public sector, including large scale voluntary transfers, the rebuild of a hospital and the merger of hospital trusts.