The new Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings System known as MyFutureFund starts from today (Thursday, 1 January 2026).
Welcoming this landmark social policy, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions general secretary Owen Reidy said:
“As is regularly said about saving for retirement – ‘The best time to start a pension was years ago, but the second-best time is now.’ Auto-enrolment is no different. The 20-year wait since government first proposed to start auto-enrolling workers into a workplace pension is highly regrettable, but unions welcome that hundreds of thousands of workers will start 2026 with access to a pension to save for a more comfortable retirement.
“Just one in three workers in the private sector are saving into an occupational pension, in large part because employers to date have not been required to contribute to their employees’ retirement savings. As the contributory state pension is not earnings-related, workers without a supplementary pension are at risk of a dramatic drop in their living standards in old age.
“Pension auto-enrolment has successfully narrowed the pension coverage gap in every country it has been introduced. In the UK, 88 per cent of eligible employees are now saving into occupational schemes for their retirement, up from 55 per cent before the introduction of auto-enrolment in 2012.”
He said: “While the 1st January is Day 1 for auto-enrolment, D Day will be when the first pay packets of the new year land later in the month. Saving into a pension will be a big behavioural change for lots of workers and, given the large numbers of workers and employers coming under the scope of auto-enrolment, teething troubles can be expected in the early days. Workers who have not been auto enrolled and believe that they should be, or have any other auto-enrolment queries, should contact their union or call the MyFutureFund helpline on 01 568 9555.”
The employee MyFutureFund portal is now live (www.myfuturefund.ie). Workers can log in using their MyGovID. From mid-January, they will be able to see their contributions and those of their employer and the State in their pension pot. They will also be able to select their preferred investment plan, monitor investment returns and exercise options to opt-out or suspend savings.
Mr Reidy added: “I want to acknowledge the work and collaborative approach of Minister Calleary and his officials, and to thank former union colleagues and others who did tremendous work over the years to make pension auto-enrolment a reality. This is the most significant social intervention to protect older people’s living standards since the Old Age Pensions Act of 1908 introduced the state pension.”
