As many as 50 per cent of self-employed workers could now be paying into a pension, a new study has claimed.

Data gathered from a survey of more than 1,800 contractors and freelancers by SJD Accountancy has found that 50.2 per cent of respondents were now saving into a personal pension scheme.

The figure is a 14 per cent increase on a similar survey conducted by the firm in 2018.

Of those that do have a pension, almost 40 per cent were above the age of 31 when they started making contributions.

Just under 43 per cent were between the ages of 22 and 30, while 18 per cent were aged 21 or under.

Findings from the survey also revealed that almost two-thirds of self-employed workers (64 per cent) expected to be working beyond the age of 64.

SJD Accountancy senior commercial manager, James Foster, said that although the study suggested that more contractors and freelancers are using personal pension schemes than in 2018, there are still an estimated 2.25 million of workers that are not choosing pensions as a means of saving for later life.

“This can be for a variety of reasons, but we often find that having easy access to earnings is the dominant factor, with many self-employed people preferring not to tie their money up in case they need access to finance between contracts or projects,” he said.

“There remains a huge gap between self-employed workers and employees, with little in the way of legislative change to try and readdress the balance,” he added.

“When you combine this with some of the upcoming changes to the contracting industry through IR35 changes in the private sector, it’s clear that more needs to be done.”

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