Take care of your partner in the event of your death | Disability pensions under the new pension rules | Questions and answers
If you’re like Brigitte: between the ages of 60 and 68 and accruing a pension with us
- Accrued value is accrued value: Brigitte will keep all the pension that she’s accrued when we switch to the new pension plan. Its value will become her personal pension capital when we switch to the new pension plan. If Philips Pensioenfonds’s finances are healthy, her personal pension capital will be topped up from the Pension Fund’s financial buffer so her projected pension will go up a little right away.
- Minor fluctuations: with Brigitte’s retirement date so close, most of the investment risk has already been phased out. When Brigitte turns 65, her investments will follow the same policy as the investments for pension beneficiaries. Her pension will be influenced by the economy, but major fluctuations will be avoided as much as possible. When the investments yield positive returns, a small portion will be added to the solidarity reserve. That collective reserve could benefit her in the short term if the economy goes badly once she’s drawing her pension.
- Compensation at the time of the switch: the new method of pension accrual could have a negative impact on members like Brigitte. However, Brigitte won’t spend many years accruing a pension under the new pension plan, so the impact will be less than for her younger colleagues. To compensate her, her personal pension capital will be topped up by an extra one-time payment. She also needs to bear in mind that she won’t be eligible for the compensation if she decides to retire before 1 January 2027.
- Individual choices: Brigitte doesn’t have the option of making individual choices about how her pension savings are invested. If she wants, however, she can add an extra 4% to her pension contributions. Another option for active members with an income of more than €87,500 is to lower their contributions (permanently or temporarily) on their salary above that amount. This will give them more income now, but less pension when they retire. With so little time until Brigitte’s retirement, those choices won’t have much impact on her pension. Brigitte should take a look at the Pension Planner now and think about what options she’ll choose when she retires.
Take care of your partner in the event of your death
- In the new pension scheme, your partner and children will receive a pension from Philips Pensioenfonds in the event of your death
- In the new pension scheme, your partner and children will receive a pension from Philips Pensioenfonds in the event of your death
- The survivor's and orphan's pension that you have accrued on 1 January 2027 will continue to exist. Your partner and children will receive this in addition to the risk coverage in the event of your death before your retirement date.
- Are you leaving employment? Then you will automatically remain insured for another 3 months (or longer if you are receiving a ZW- of WW-benefit). After that, you can voluntarily continue the risk coverage as long as you do not (yet) have a new employer.
- Are you retiring? Then you choose how much survivor's pension you want for your (possible) partner and children in the event of your death after your retirement. This is financed from your personal pension capital.
Disability pensions under the new pension rules
- If you are unable to work due to disability, Philips Pensioenfonds will continue to pay pension premiums. As is the case now, there is also a disability pension scheme that provides a supplement to the WIA benefit of up to 75% of the salary (in the event of full disability).
Questions & answers
for members between the ages of 60 and 68
The short answer to that is: the new pension rules will apply to everyone who accrues a pension or receives a pension in the Netherlands. It does not matter whether you retire before or after the transition. We explain this below.
'Invaren'
The new rules assume that all pensions that have now been accrued, including those of those who have already retired, will fall under the new rules. In pension jargon we then speak of 'invaren'.
We will take measures to ensure that fluctuations in your pension from year to year are limited as much as possible. We posted an explanation video on our website that discusses the movements in your pension when the new pension rules apply.
In the new pension system, it remains possible to retire earlier or later. In addition, there are similar flexibilisation options, such as a high-low scheme. The Pension Planner will be redesigned at the time the new pension scheme comes into effect. From that moment on, you will be able to make your own calculations for your pension, just like now.
Essentially, the compensation works as follows:
- The compensation will be provided to all active members (including members with non-contributory pension accrual due to disability) between the ages of 40 and 68 at the moment of the transition (1 January 2027).
- When we switch to the new pension plan, those members will receive an extra one-time payment into their personal pension capital. This will give them a higher pension when they reach retirement age than they would have without the compensation.
- If Philips Pensioenfonds has a funding ratio of 106% or higher when we make the switch, the compensation will be paid entirely from the pension fund’s assets. If the funding ratio is lower, it will be impossible to pay the compensation entirely from the pension fund’s assets, and some or all of it will need to be financed from the pension contributions.
Based on the compensation system, the transition effects for active members in the 40-to-68 age group will be similar to the effects for the other age groups. This means that the compensation system will help to ensure a balanced transition for all the member groups.
How much compensation you will receive is impossible to calculate until we switch to the new pension plan. We will send you personalised information near the end of 2026. The transition plan includes a diagram that gives an idea of how much your compensation will be; however, it is not definite yet whether we can carry out the compensation system as described in the transition plan. We have to wait for the Dutch central bank (DNB), as our supervisory authority, to approve the arrangements that have been made (see ‘Is the compensation system final?’).
The transition plan drawn up by the employers and the unions describes how the compensation system will be given shape. The Board of Trustees of Philips Pensioenfonds has reviewed the compensation system, and agrees with the employers and the unions that it will help to ensure a balanced transition. Even so, it is not final yet. Ultimately, the Dutch central bank (DNB), as our supervisory authority, has to give us approval to convert the accrued pensions to the new pension plan. The compensation system is part of the arrangements to make sure that the conversion is balanced. We have to submit a large number of documents (including the implementation plan and a conversion template), which that supervisory authority will study before deciding whether it can give us approval. Reviewing all those documents, a process that is referred to in practice as ‘reviewing the conversion request’, is labour-intensive, and we are working on the assumption that it will be 2026 before we know whether or not we have DNB’s approval. Only when the supervisory authority has given its approval will we know whether we can carry out the compensation system in its contemplated form.
If you take early retirement before we switch to the new pension plan on 1 January 2017, you will not receive the compensation. The purpose of the compensation is to make up for a future negative impact on the pension accrual under Philips Pensioenfonds’s new pension plan. If you retire, you will not be accruing a pension with us anymore, and the new way of accruing a pension will not have a negative impact on your pension with Philips Pensioenfonds.
If you are considering taking early retirement around 1 January 2027, it could be best to push it back until after 1 January 2027 so that you will be entitled to the compensation. One of the factors determining the amount of the compensation is your age when we switch to the new pension plan, so we recommend finding out as much as you can before you decide on your retirement date. Ask our Service Desk for information.
That is correct. Under the new system, you will have a personal pension capital that is invested. The value of your pension capital will fluctuate over time. You will be able to see how much pension capital you have at a particular moment. You will also be able to see what developments have affected it, either increasing its value (contributions and investment gains, for example) or decreasing its value (such as benefits that you have drawn or investment losses).
How much pension you can draw from your pension capital after you retire will not be predetermined: instead, it will depend on factors such as future investment yields and the interest rates when you retire. Those yields will depend on your age: while you are young, more of your pension capital will be invested in equities (shares) and its value will fluctuate more strongly than when you are older and it is invested more conservatively.
When the new system is introduced, your pension will also be affected more strongly by economic fluctuations: it will be more likely to go up in times of prosperity, but also more likely to go down when the economy is struggling. We will try to prevent a decrease in pension benefits as much as possible.
With regard to the increase in your pension: in the current pension system, this is always done through indexation. In new pension system your pension will not be indexed in the way that it is now. Whether your pension goes up depends on the amount of your personal pension assets. And also besides the investment return, the projection return will be determining the yearly adjustment of the benefit. More information about the projection return can be found on our Question and Answers page under the question: 'Is the calculation interest rate in the new pension system no longer important at all?'.
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