Can a company sack you for not accepting a pension change

Southend1

atush wrote: »

A union will help in the consultation stage here, hopefully pushing up the employers contribs. otherwise, unhelpful to mention a union, if there a- isn't one, or B- too late to help

There is always a union. Even if one isn't recognised by the employer, OP could seek legal advice from whatever union he was a member of.

mania112

With a Final Salary it is very rare you are told what you are provided with in retirement INCLUDING future service and salary - it's almost just based on the day the statement was provided.

So if you have a statement which says you are currently entitled to £20k per annum, that will still be the case (usually) if you then become deferred from the scheme.

I don't understand why you wouldn't accept the new pension - it's better than not contributing to one.

Final Salary pensions are being closed all over, it's not great to hear, but the alternative for the company might be redundancies...

WobblyDog

I've worked for a couple of companies where this has happened. I don't think anyone got sacked in either case. I think the best you can hope for in this situation is to negotiate the good terms for the new (presumably defined contribution) pension.

If you are retaining the benefits accrued to date in the final salary pension and it's becoming a deferred pension, that's not altogether bad. You will then have both a final salary and a defined contribution pension. While FS pensions tend to be more generous, DC pensions tend to be more flexible, and are exposed to a different set of risks. Politicians rarely fiddle with the regulations for both types at the same time.

marlot

I've been through this three times now, at three different organisations.

Nothing you can do, alas, apart from leave.

Peelerfart

"This is a multi billion pound company"

It's not Tata Steel is it?

agarnett

With nonsense such as threatened termination for not signing, it sounds more like some shopfloor bullying at Tesco.

As WobblyDog suggests, the ten years service that said employee already has in a final salary scheme is of course not torn up and lost. If it was still a true FS scheme then the "final salary on exit" would be the salary at the point the old scheme closed, but revalued annually to hopefully inflation proof the entitlement earned to date, to scheme retirement date. So if it was a 40ths scheme that would broadly qualify said employee to a pension at scheme retirement of 10/40 of what said employee may have hoped for by achieving 40 years service before retirement, and that first ten years worth of decent pension should largely be protected. We haven't been told if the scheme will be wound up. For the moment it sounds like it will just be closed to new contributions, and the employee has just been asked to join the new scheme. The old scheme entitlement will not be moved to the new scheme although it might be run as a part of something under a joint heading.

On the question of statements of benefits, active members are very often given annual statements based on current salary as final salary and which assume the employee will work continuously to scheme retirement date. So typically but simplistically put, if said employee has worked 10 years, is 30 now and on £30,000, and scheme retirement is age 60, and the scheme maximum years qualifying service is 40 years with the scheme accrual being on a 60ths basis, then the statement will say the expected pension (current day values on current salary) 40/60 x £30,000 = £20,000pa. If the scheme stops taking contributions now, then the deferred (protected?) entitlement using the same rough example might be 10/60 x £30,000 = £5,000pa plus whatever the new scheme yields for the final 30 years.

Said employee should make sure they ask for a cash equivalent transfer value from the old scheme right now, and then each 12 months as a means of keeping tabs on it. They should also ask now for back numbers of all the formal Annual Pension Scheme Reports (not just newsletters), and Annual Actuarial Reports. Finally they should get back numbers of Company Annual Report and Accounts. And they should collect all the new ones as issued going forward and prepare a space in the loft! Age 60 comes faster than you expect when this kind of bvggeration factor has started becoming commonplace.

These things are the only place you might get close to the real picture of what is going on with the scheme and be able to defend your own rights later on. Said employee should also keep every scrap of paperwork or even general notice they have ever been given on the subject of pensions.

So it was a good run until this point, but the "cash builder" pension earned for the remainder of service with this particular employer is going to be a much leaner run bý the sounds of it, and with plonkers like said employer's boss making ludicrous threats, it sounds like it ain't going to be much fun.

5 years ago, the ridiculous threat of termination as described could have easily led to a straightforward case against the employer at an Employment Tribunal, but of course the employment market landscape has been wound back 40 or 50 years since then so best to keep your head down and suck it up cleverly until said employee decides to move on. And since Bob Crowe disappeared off the scene, there are very few unions you can trust to make a fuss now so probably that's already a dead end.

timbo58

atush wrote: »

Timbo, you aren't the OP
Let them state the case that they have- stat your own thread if you have a problem.
SNIP

Eh? - and my post offends how?
Presumably because you didn't agree with it?

No - I don't need to start my own thread as I don't have any issue if you'd read my post rather than jumping in like an overactive moderator you'd have seen that, it was merely an opinion based on my favourable experience of union membership in reply to Kidmugsys unfavourable one.

zagfles

atush wrote: »

Or they could just give you no pension if you opt out? That is an option if you dont like the new pension, but it would be a bad choice.

The facts of the matter are, that you have a contract. but employment contracts re pension can be changed, although the employees usually get a consultation period to discuss. And are usually replaced with something that is better than the average company pension.

To be pedantic, contracts can't be changed without the consent of both parties, otherwise contracts wouldn't be worth the paper they're written on.

But employment contracts will have termination periods which allows either party to terminate the contract subject to a notice period. Over and above the contract, employees have various protections in law, whatever the contract states the employer needs to jump through some additional hoops to terminate the contract.

The way employers "change" contracts re pensions etc is they have a consultation period after which they tell employees that their current contract will be terminated (and of course they must give the notice period specified in the contract), but they can sign a new contract identical to the old one except for the pension terms.

Any existing built up pension rights must be preserved, otherwise it'd be a backdated pay cut.

atush

Southend1 wrote: »

There is always a union. Even if one isn't recognised by the employer, OP could seek legal advice from whatever union he was a member of.

Cant see anyone paying to be a member if the union doesnt cover their current employment?

Freecall

atush wrote: »

Cant see anyone paying to be a member if the union doesnt cover their current employment?

I can.

You probably have limited life experience of the role of unions but rest assured there are lots of people who are union members where their employer does not recognise that (or any) union.