Proposals to increase retirement age and pension contribution |05 February 2022
One of the presentations during the session yesterday (Photo: Louis Toussaint)
SPF continues with education and awareness sessions
The Seychelles Pension Fund (SPF) is continuing with its series of education and awareness sessions on proposals to increase retirement age and pension contribution rate in order to make the fund more sustainable in the long run.
Following awareness sessions with the Citizens Engagement Platform Seychelles (Ceps), the Seychelles Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI), the Seychelles Media Commission and the media, the organisation met with heads of human resources and payroll officers from government and other organisations.
Held at the Seychelles Trading Company (STC) conference room, the half-day education and awareness session yesterday was led by the chief executive of the SPF, Nisreen Abdulmajid; the assistant risk manager, Marcus Esparon; the head of benefit, Jeffery Moses; the chief investment officer, Davis Laporte and the head of business development and compliance, Rudy Rose.
The aim of the session was to impart knowledge on the proposals to increase retirement age and pension contribution rate so that it can be explained to employees at work places.
Through detailed PowerPoint presentations, the audience learned on the history, objectives, benefits, the different contributions, investments and changes in demographics affecting SPF among others.
Ms Abdulmajid said that with fewer births and with people living longer and therefore the country having an ageing population, there would be fewer contributors to SPF and it has been found necessary to come up with these proposals to increase retirement age from 63 to 65 years old in 2023 amid the mandatory contribution at 6% of gross salary (3% employees and 3% employers) which will also be further revised and gradually increase over the years to allow SPF to continue paying benefits. Members can also contribute voluntarily starting from R50.
Following an assessment, in 2018 SPF collected R27 million every month and that increased on a yearly basis to R34 million to date. As part of its obligation to pay a pension to its members, SPF in 2018 was paying out on average R23 million per month but with more people retiring as a result of our ageing population, the sum being paid out to members every month as of 2021-2022 is R43 million on average.
Ms Abdulmajid stated that SPF is running a deficit with regard to the amount collected and the amount being distributed and with the new proposals and SPF’s investments, it will help mitigate the situation to make the fund more sustainable in the years to come. It is to be noted that SPF has to date 40,000 members contributing to its coffers.
During the presentation, one of the SPF presenters, Jeffery Moses, took the opportunity to call on the session’s participants to advise and educate their employees on the need to plan their retirement early and to come to SPF one month before they leave work so as to give SPF staff enough time to work on formalities.
He stated that most people who retire contact the office one day before they retire or the day after they had retired which is causing some challenges with regard to bills and loans that the retirees have to pay.
He also called on them to identify and to put in order documents pertaining to people in the retirement age of 60 years old (SPF retirement age limit) so as to help in facilitating procedures.
Patrick Joubert
