European law prohibits inertia selling of financial products, including personal pensions. This means that it is not possible to automatically enrol individuals into workplace personal pension arrangements, such as group personal pensions and group stakeholder pensions.
The DWP is consulting on how best to ensure that such arrangements can continue in the run-up to 2012 and beyond, when our reforms to the UK private pensions system come into effect. DWP officials continue to work closely with industry representatives to understand the issues involved and to devise pragmatic solutions.
Inertia selling is the provision of unsolicited services with a demand for payment.