FSRA Working With Pension Sector to Help Ensure Members Receive Their Benefits

TORONTO, June 23, 2020 /CNW/ - The Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario (FSRA) is continuing to work with those we regulate to ensure financial safety, fairness and choice for consumers and members during this time of rapid change and disruption.

FSRA is consulting with the public and the sector to ensure pension plans stay connected with their members.

We are seeking your feedback on two Guidance documents: Principles and Practices Regarding Missing Members, which provide principles and practices for plans, advisors and plan members to remain in contact or reconnect with their plans. This is to help ensure members receive their benefits they when they fall due; and Waiver of Biennial Statements for Missing Former and Retired Members which outlines FSRA's process to apply to waive the requirement to issue a biennial statement under the Pension Benefits Act.

These draft documents reflect the input from our Ad-Hoc Technical Advisory Committee for Missing Members which included sector participants, who shared unique and diverse perspectives. We would like to thank the committee members for their valuable input.

Although the committee completed its work pre-COVID, the start of the consulation was delayed to allow FSRA to focus on the challenges brought on by the pandemic. We now want to hear more broadly from the sector and plan members, and recognize that a longer consultation period may be required to provide valuable feedback. We invite you to submit comments via the FSRA website until September 20, 2020.

FSRA will begin collecting data on missing members from plan administrators as part of the regular data collection process, to inform future initiatives and to evaluate the effectiveness of these new Guidance documents. These datapoints are not intended to create additional administrative burden. FSRA will begin collecting information about missing members later this summer on a voluntary basis, to ease the transition and allow the sector to become familiar with the process. We encourage all plan administrators to participate.

This public consultation, Guidance and collection of missing member data support FSRA's mandate of promoting good administration of pension plans and protecting pension benefits and the rights of beneficiaries. We look forward to receiving your feedback.

www.fsrao.ca

SOURCE Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario