Pensions Board publishes Customer Charter - Website recording 12,000 visits a month

Thursday 3 March 2005: Dublin: Anne Maher, CEO Pensions Board, today, launched the Pensions Board’s Customer Charter, Customer Action Plan 2004-2007 and Comment & Complaints form. These combined documents represent the Board’s sustained commitment to the continued development of its customer services.

The Customer Action Plan (CAP) formalises and records what the Board currently does in the area of customer service and signposts how the Board proposes to develop its services in line with modern quality customer service principles. The CAP also requires that progress in meeting specific standards be evaluated and reported.

The Customer Charter is a public statement detailing the Board’s standards and services including specific service commitments.

Speaking at the launch Anne Maher said, “The Board is committed to delivering high quality customer service and is pleased that recent customer surveys indicate a good level of customer satisfaction. The Pensions Board, to date, has offered a number of customer information service tools including the web-site which experienced 145,332 visits over the last twelve months, with an average of over 12,000 visits per month”.

Anne Maher continued: “At the core of any effective Customer Charter initiative is a formal customer comment and complaint system. This type of feedback is essential to enable us to continue improving services to our customers.”

The Customer Charter, in leaflet format, and the Comment & Complaints Form are available for customers to take away from the Pensions Board’s office, Verschoyle House, 28/30 Lr Mount Street, Dublin 2, phone 1890 65 65 65. All documentation including the Customer Action Plan, is available by logging onto the web-site www.pensionsboard.ie.

Media Queries:

Mary Hutch
Head of Information and Training
The Pensions Board Tel: (01) 6131900

Aongus Horgan
Assistant Head of Information and Training
The Pensions Board Tel: (01) 6131900

Jackie Gallagher
Q4 Public Relations Tel: (01) 4751444 / 087 2371838

 
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About the Pension’s Calculator

  • This pension’s calculator is designed to give a broad indication of the level of contributions required to give your desired pension at your retirement age. This calculator only provides a sample indication of the funding contributions for your pension and no reliance should be placed on it.
  • This calculator does not take into account any contributions an employer might make to your pension.
  • Do you know that contributions paid to a pension scheme will benefit from income tax relief at your highest rate of income tax? This calculator takes into account current income tax relief benefits.
  • For a full and accurate assessment of your personal finances and any tax relief you may be entitled to on your pension contributions always consult with a professional financial adviser

The next step is to talk to your employer, trade union, bank, insurance company, building society or financial advisor about starting your pension today.

Pension Calculator Notes:
  1. Assumptions used: Investment return will be 5% per year before retirement and 4% per year after retirement. Salary will increase at 3% per year. Pension will increase at 2% per year in retirement. The State Pension will increase in line with salary increases. Spouse's annuity assumes a 3 year age gap between the Main Life and Spouse. Your personal illustration above makes an approximate allowance for the recently introduced Pensions Levy (i.e. 0.6% of your Fund Value) until 2014 or your intended retirement year if earlier.
  2. Contribution amounts shown will increase each year as salary increases.
  3. The actual pension at retirement will depend on actual investment return and salary inflation up to retirement and on the cost of purchasing annuities at retirement.
  4. Tax relief calculations take account of age related limits on tax relief in any given year as prescribed by the Revenue. Your financial advisor will be able to help you to stay within your limits. The maximum tax relief as a % of earnings are as follows:
         Under 30: 15%
         30 to 39: 20%
         40 to 49: 25%
         50 to 54: 30%
         55 to 59: 35%
         60 and over: 40%
  5. Contributions or benefits may exceed limits prescribed by the Revenue. Your financial advisor will be able to help you to stay within your limits. Budget 2011, introduced a Standard Fund Threshold (SFT) of €2.3 million. Individuals with pension funds in excess of this value as at 7 December 2010 may apply for a Personal Fund Threshold(PFT). When the capital value of pension benefits drawn down by an individual exceed his or her SFT or PFT as appropriate, a tax charge of 41% is applied to the excess fund.
  6. In these net contribution calculations, PAYE & single persons tax reliefs and single persons tax bands are assumed. It is also assumed that no other tax reliefs apply.
  7. The annuity rate used to convert your pension fund at retirement age is a long term average annuity rate, which makes no allowance for the recent gender equalisation ruling. The annuity rate used in your personal illustration above will be shown when you run the calculator.
  8. This calculator takes account of the fact that the State Pension (Transition) will no longer be paid from 1 January 2014. This means that there will then be a standard State Pension age of 66 years for everyone. If you have qualified for the State Pension Transition before 1 January 2014 you remain entitled to it for the duration of your claim (1 year). State pension age will increase to 67 in 2021 and to 68 in 2028