Employers who fail to heed 28-day warning notices risk a fine which increases each day, a report published by The Pensions Regulator (TPR) shows.

More than 95% of the first small employers required to put their staff into a workplace pension have now complied with the law, showing that automatic enrolment is successful for all sizes of employer.

While compliance rates remain high, TPR’s latest quarterly compliance and enforcement bulletin shows that the number of Escalating Penalty Notices it issues is on the rise.

An Escalating Penalty Notice (EPN) is one of the statutory powers TPR has to help maximise employer compliance with automatic enrolment duties. It specifies the date by which the employer must comply with certain actions or be subject to a fine which builds up at a daily rate.

The fine for small employers with 1 to 4 staff who fail to comply with an EPN is £50 per day and for those with 5 to 49 it is £500 per day.

Minister for Pensions, Baroness Ros Altmann, said: “Automatic enrolment is delivering fundamental change to workplace pension saving. So far over 100,000 employers have enrolled over 6 million workers. Levels of compliance amongst employers has been consistently high and I am pleased with all the steps The Pensions Regulator has put in place to support the huge number of smaller employers who have recently begun to undertake their duties.

Charles Counsell, Executive Director for automatic enrolment, said: “Most employers comply on time and we continue to see compliance rates in the high nineties. Others need a nudge and are prompted to meet their duties when one of our notices comes through their letterbox."