pension funds protection / regulation

D

derryman

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Does anyone know exactly how pension funds are protected in the event of a combined bank / life assurance organisation having financial difficulty.

We all know about the depositor protection schemes - but what pension fund protection schemes exist - there are well documented examples of stock brokerage firms collapsing and the clients (fund holders) being stung badly

The company I am thinking about is most exposed to the FTB / 100% mortgage sub-prime lending that took place in Ireland in the last 3 years, and has only recently divulged that it has a 15 billion euro line of credit from the ECB as a "lender of last resort" and has drawn down over five billion of this already as it cannot get the funds at a suitable wholesale rate due to its own credit default swap ratings / collateral being offered.
 
The only thing I can get here is regulations regarding the movement of funds from employee to employer to pension provider to final pension fund

The question I have is how is the pension fund eg Irish Life Cash Fund ringfenced from the finances of Irish life and its associated subsidiaries.

I have noted that Irish life / our pension administrator Mercer is taking months at a time recently to actually confirm investment of my personal money into their funds after receipt from my employer - this makes me wonder what they are doing in the interim with the funds to be invested and how secure all the funds really are.

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With effect from 1 January 2003, Sections 41 and 42 of the Pensions (Amendment) Act, 2002, inserted Section 58A and replaced Section 59 of the Pensions Acts 1990 to 2004.
Section 58A requires employers to ensure that contributions deducted from employees salaries are paid to the scheme trustees (or a third party if that is normally the case) within 21 days of the end of the month in which the contributions were deducted. This requirement also applies to employer contributions in respect of a defined contribution scheme. Section 58A also provides for disclosure requirements obliging the employer to notify the members of the amounts that have been deducted and remitted on their behalf.
Section 59(1) requires the trustees to invest any contributions covered by Section 58A within 10 days of the latest date on which those contributions should have been remitted to the trustees by the employer. There is a link at the bottom of this page to the Remittance of Contributions FAQs prepared by the Board.
 
Ok - so maybe this is a bump but this is quite a pressing query in my mind

To date all the talk has been about preserving deposits of tens of thousands and what protection is available in the event of default but in reality most people have hundreds of thousands tied up in pension funds - does anyone know what protection is available if a bancassurance operation goes belly up and you have pension funds there - there seems to be no government initiative in this area to protect consumer funds
 
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