Pensions - Articles - Actuarial Association of Europe's response to EIOPA

 “The paper seeks to set out Good Practices which should apply when individuals seek to transfer their occupational pension rights to another pension arrangement, either within the same Member State, or cross-border to a pension arrangement in another EU Member State.”

  

 The Portability Directive stopped short of requiring individuals to be given a right to transfer and hence this EIOPA report will not be binding on Member States. Many of the Good Practices identified already apply in some Member States, but the Report identifies some aspects where the transfer process could be made easier and more efficient. In general, the AAE supports the Good Practices (GP) identified.

  

 Falco Valkenburg: “We welcome the EIOPA approach that a rights transfer is not a must, but a choice for individuals, based on their own personal preference and depending on the details of the pension arrangements. As a consequence of individual freedom the AAE would not support a recommendation that small DC accounts should be forced to transfer.”

 In general all individuals with pension rights should be able to keep track of their pension entitlements and to obtain updated information on request. This would be facilitated if there were national/EU wide tracking or tracing services1 which enabled individuals to get details of their pensions from previous employments (and indeed ideally their personal pension policies and State pension entitlements as well).