Pension auto-enrolment in Ireland: what MyFutureFund means for pubs, restaurants and hotels

Since 1 January 2026, every Irish employer has had a new cost on part of its wage bill: MyFutureFund, the State's pension auto-enrolment scheme. For pubs, restaurants, cafés and hotels, where wages are the biggest cost after stock, it's worth understanding exactly who is enrolled, what you pay, and how the rate will climb over the next ten years.

This guide is general information checked against gov.ie and Citizens Information on 3 November 2026. It isn't financial or pensions advice. Your payroll provider or accountant should confirm how it applies to your staff.

Who is enrolled

MyFutureFund is run by the National Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings Authority (NAERSA), under the Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings System Act 2024. NAERSA, not you, decides who is enrolled, using Revenue payroll data. An employee is enrolled automatically for a job if they are:

• aged 23 to 60,
• earning €20,000 or more a year across all their employments, and
• not paying into a pension through payroll for that job.

If an employee already has an occupational pension, a PRSA or similar where it's recorded in payroll, that job is exempt. Someone with two jobs can be enrolled for the one with no payroll pension.

To check the earnings test, NAERSA looks back over up to 13 weeks. Citizens Information puts the short-period figure at more than €5,000 over 13 weeks. Someone with a clear earnings record is enrolled straight away. A new starter, or someone returning after a gap, can take up to 13 weeks to be assessed, and contributions are not backdated for that time. Once enrolled, an employee stays enrolled even if their earnings later drop below €20,000.

What €20,000 means on a hospitality roster

At the minimum wage of €14.15 an hour, €20,000 a year is about 27 hours a week, every week of the year. In practice that means:

• Most full-time staff aged 23 and over will be enrolled unless they already have a pension through payroll.
• Part-timers on 15 to 20 hours usually won't be, unless they have a second job that takes them over €20,000 in total.
• Under-23s, which on many bar and floor teams is a big share of the staff, aren't auto-enrolled at all.

Anyone who isn't enrolled automatically can still opt in: Citizens Information says they must be an employee aged over 18 and up to pension age, 66, and not paying into a pension through payroll. When someone opts in, you have exactly the same duties as for an enrolled employee, including the matching contribution.

Contribution rates and how they rise

The employee pays a set percentage of gross pay, the employer pays the same, and the State adds a top-up of €1 for every €3 the employee pays. The rates are phased in over ten years:

A few rules that matter for budgeting:

• It's worked out on gross pay. gov.ie says anything in the gross pay field of the payroll file counts. If overtime, premiums or extra hours go through payroll as gross pay, they carry the contribution too.
• Nothing above €80,000. Contributions aren't taken on gross pay over €80,000 a year.
• The rate is fixed. Neither you nor the employee can pay more or less than the set rate.
• No pay, no contribution. When an employee isn't being paid, for example on unpaid leave, there's nothing to deduct, and nothing for you to match.
• The employee's share comes from net pay. Contributions are calculated on gross pay and taken from net pay after deductions; there's no tax relief on the employee's share because the State top-up replaces it.
• Your share is deductible. gov.ie says employer contributions are deductible for corporation tax and aren't a benefit-in-kind for the employee.

What it adds to the wage bill

One full-time employee

Take a chef aged 30 on €14.15 an hour, rostered 39 hours a week all year: €551.85 a week, or €28,696.20 a year. They have no other pension.

The chef pays the same amount from their own pay, and the State adds €2.76 a week in 2026 to 2028. A head chef on €45,000 costs €675 a year in employer contributions now, rising to €2,700 a year from 2035.

Across the whole venue

The quickest way to budget is per €1,000 of gross pay for enrolled staff: €15 now, €30 from 2029, €45 from 2032 and €60 from 2035. A venue whose enrolled staff earn €10,000 a week in total pays €150 a week in employer contributions today, and €600 a week from 2035, all else being equal.

That cost sits on top of employer PRSI, which went up on 1 October 2026. Our guide to employer PRSI for hospitality covers those rates, and the guide to labour cost percentage for Irish venues shows how to add pension, PRSI, annual leave and public holidays into one figure you can measure against sales. The labour cost calculator does the arithmetic.

Part-time, seasonal and student staff

Hospitality teams change shape through the year, so a few rules are worth knowing:

• Seasonal starters may not be enrolled in time. If someone joins for the summer and has no recent earnings record, assessment can take up to 13 weeks, and contributions aren't backdated. Someone who worked through the winter elsewhere and comes to you on good hours may be enrolled straight away.
• Leaving doesn't undo it. The savings pot follows the employee from job to job. When they leave you, your contributions simply stop.
• Hours that drop don't take them out. Once enrolled, an employee stays in even if their earnings fall below €20,000. Only the employee can opt out or suspend.
• Second jobs count. A bartender on €14,000 with you and €8,000 elsewhere earns over €20,000 in total, so can be enrolled for each job that has no payroll pension.
• Students and under-23s aren't auto-enrolled, but they can opt in, and if they do, you match their contributions.

Don't change anyone's roster or hours because they've been enrolled, or to stop them being enrolled. gov.ie says the Workplace Relations Commission deals with cases where employees are hindered from joining MyFutureFund or penalised for doing so.

Opt-outs, suspensions and re-enrolment

These are the employee's choices, made through NAERSA, never yours:

• Opting out: an employee must stay in for at least 6 months, then has a two-month window (months 7 and 8) to opt out and get their own contributions back. Your contributions and the State's stay in their pot.
• Suspending: after the first 6 months they can pause contributions at any time. Your contributions pause too. They must wait at least 12 months before restarting.
• After a rate rise: when the rate goes up, there's another opt-out window 6 months later.
• Re-enrolment: anyone who opts out or suspends is automatically re-enrolled after 2 years if they're still eligible.

Your duties as an employer

gov.ie sets out the employer's side, and most of it is handled through payroll:

1. Register on the MyFutureFund employer portal at myfuturefund.ie, logging in with your ROS certificate (or through your agent's ROS access). Complete your company profile and set up a payment method; a variable direct debit is recommended.
2. Apply the payroll notification. When an employee is enrolled, NAERSA sends an Automatic Enrolment Payroll Notification through payroll software telling you the contributions to deduct and pay. The contributions show on the employee's payslip. If you don't use payroll software, the employer portal lets you submit and pay directly.
3. Pay on time. Contributions must be paid when the employee is paid, with the contribution information sent to NAERSA. Withheld or underpaid contributions attract interest.
4. Tell employees when they're first enrolled. This is a duty on you, and the portal provides material to help.
5. Never pressure anyone to opt out or suspend. Employers can be prosecuted and fined, and NAERSA will publish a list of employers convicted of non-compliance.

Auto-enrolment doesn't replace any existing obligations you have to facilitate pensions or PRSAs for employees.

What to do now

• Check your portal profile is complete and that a payment method is set up.
• Ask your payroll provider to confirm notifications are being applied and contributions paid each pay date.
• Look at who's enrolled. Your payslips show it. Most of your full-time staff aged 23 and over should be there unless they're in another payroll pension.
• Put pension into your labour cost. Add 1.5% of gross pay for enrolled staff now, and plan for 3% from 2029.
• Brief your managers. Staff will ask about the deduction on their payslip. The answer is that it's their pension, matched by you and topped up by the State, and that opting out is their choice to make on the MyFutureFund portal.

How ShiftComplete helps

ShiftComplete doesn't run wages or pensions, and it doesn't calculate contributions. What it does is make the hours behind the wage bill clear. You build the roster from staff availability, see each person's rostered hours for the week, and publish it to every phone at once. With clocking in switched on, staff clock in and out on their phone or a shared tablet, and you can download a spreadsheet of hours worked with a total per person, ready to hand to whoever runs your wages.

That makes the new cost easier to plan: rostered hours, times the hourly rate, times 1.5%, for each enrolled member of staff. ShiftComplete costs €1.99 per active staff member per month, with every feature included, no contract, and the first 60 days free with no card needed. See ShiftComplete in Ireland, or read our guide to the minimum wage in 2026.