The retirement journey – Employment relationships

THE SHIPPING Association of Jamaica (SAJ) celebrates its 85th anniversary this year. To empower its members, Shipping Industry continues its retirement planning series focusing from early career stages to retirement, as a helpful member benefit.

As an adult, seeking an employment relationship becomes high on your agenda. This is important as it supports both your compulsory and voluntary financial requirements to contribute to approved retirement savings plans and to assist with additional investments to other financial savings and benefits plans, said Magdalena Cooper-de Neuze, a licensed life insurance sales representative and pensions consultant at Solid Life and General Insurance Brokers Limited. In this week’s article, the discussion will focus on employment relationship benefits plans which provide financial and income support to employees upon a retirement life event: old age, disability or death.

For employment relationships, there are rules and responsibilities which need to be adopted, practised and followed by each party. Hence, there are rules each party must adhere to, whether by legislation or based on the specific employment work environment. For example, for people employed in the shipping industry, it is well known that their environment includes ship work and the ocean waters, Cooper-de Neuze said. For those not in the industry, you may think it is a beautiful, serene and safe working environment. However, this is only possible where employees follow the rules and regulations, whether on a ship or in an office.

So, let us apply some rules and principles to your retirement journey during your employment relationship. The following are some employment relationship benefits, shared by Cooper-de Neuze, which provide the rules which contribute to your retirement journey for the benefits payable in the event of old age, disability and death.

• NIS and NHT: These plans are governed by the National Insurance Act, 1966 and National Housing Trust Act, 1976, respectively. As an employment rule, your NIS card was required by your employer at the start of your employment relationship. Your unique NIS number also provides the details for making your contributions to NHT during your employment relationship.

Rule: Keep all your payslips as this helps with claiming your NIS and NHT benefits when due and payable.

• Group Health, Life, Accidental Death & Dismemberment (AD&D): First, your employer’s HR would provide you with an enrolment form to complete and return. Next, you are provided with the details of the health insurance benefits and a card which may be used when accessing benefits for yourself and, where applicable, your dependents. For the group life and AD&D, a certificate is provided. It is your employer who establishes the contract with the provider. The contract provides the rules for the employer and the benefits for its employees.

Rule: Store your health card and certificate(s) in a safe place.

• Approved Retirement Savings Plans – Approved superannuation funds (ASF) and approved retirement schemes (ARS): These plans are offered by private- sector organisations to their employees, as provided by FSC-licensed life insurance and financial institutions. These plans are governed by legislation. However, each plan must have a document which provides the rules for making contributions on becoming a member and the payment of any retirement financial benefits. For example, if you are in an ASF, the governing document is known as the Trust Deed and Rules. For an ARS, the governing document is known as the Master Trust Deed and Rules. In accordance with legislation, a plan member can request a copy of the plan’s document.

Rule: Store all certificates and plan documents in a safe place.

To conclude today’s article, here’s a question to ponder: Have you stored all your employment payslips and retirement benefits plan documents in a safe place?