Earn secure income in retirement by building your pension while you work
member enrolment
Note: If you work full time and your employer participates in the CAAT Plan, you are automatically enrolled in the Plan. This page does not apply to you. For any questions on your Plan enrolment, contact your HR administrator.
If you work part-time or on contract you have the choice to enrol in the Plan anytime during your employment via DBplus (unless enrolment becomes mandatory in your jurisdiction of employment after a certain threshold). Once a DBplus member, contributions are deducted every pay that go towards your pension. Your employer also contributes to the Plan, increasing your overall pension. Each employer has its own contribution rate expressed as a percentage of your salary. Visit the Your contributions page to see your employer’s rates.
Once you're enrolled in the Plan, you can't opt out. The choice to enrol is yours to make, but CAAT is here to answer any questions you might have.
Choosing to enrol in DBplus means choosing a secure and predictable retirement income. A pay cheque deposited every month in your account helps you enjoy retirement free of financial stress or burden. But DBplus is more than just that – it gives you control of things like deciding when you want to retire, and portability of the account, peace of mind with survivor benefits, and expert pension guidance with inflation protection.
Protecting your pension starts right away while you work and continues after you retire.
Remove the stress from your loved ones with a secure stream of income for your spouse if you die before or after you retire.
Retire when the time is right for you. You can retire as early as age 50, or as late as age 71.
Your pension can move with you with termination options providing both flexibility and security so you can make the best choice for your retirement income.
Your ideal retirement could be within reach.
While a modern defined pension plan offers a myriad of benefits to support your retirement dreams, it is important to consider your options and ensure this is the right choice for you. When you decide to enrol and become a member of the Plan, you are required to contribute on the earnings you receive from all participating employers, and you cannot opt out and stop contributing.
CAAT has a variety of tools to help you in your decision making:
Click the button below to learn more about plan features.
Use this tool to help you analyse the benefits of joining.
Once you’ve made the decision that DBplus is the right choice for you, it’s easy to enrol:
We've answered some of the most-asked questions about enrolling in DBplus, below. If your question isn't answered here, contact our member services team.
If you are no longer employed by a participating employer, and you are not yet eligible to retire, you remain a Plan member for 24 months, referred to as Extension of Membership (EOM) period. If you take a job at a new employer that participates in the CAAT Plan during those 24 months, you will resume contributing to the Plan and you will earn additional benefits. To learn about your transfer options on Extension of Membership, visit the page “Leaving your job.”
You will receive your options from the Plan shortly after your Extension of Membership period has passed. Your benefit is locked-in, which means even if you leave the Plan before retirement, it must be used for retirement income, and cannot be taken as a cash payout.
In that case, you will automatically start making contributions and earning a pension in DBprime and start making contributions and earning a pension at the DBprime rates. For every year you contributed to DBplus, you will get a full year of early retirement eligibility service recognized under DBprime. This will help you reach your earliest unreduced retirement date under DBprime sooner.
When you retire, your total pension would be the combined pension earned under both Plan designs.
If you begin working at an employer that only participates in DBplus, and move to full-time employment, you would continue earning a pension in DBplus.
You can choose to continue to receive your pension, or you can suspend pension payments, rejoin the Plan and contribute under the DBplus plan design. Members may contribute to the Plan up until November 30 of the year in which they turn 71, after which members must begin receiving their pension payments by law.
Only you can decide if enrolling in the CAAT Pension Plan is right for you. Once you’ve reviewed all the information you should be ready to decide if you want to enrol now and start building your retirement income in DBplus. You may have the option to enrol at any time during your employment, and begin building a pension from that point forward, but the sooner you enrol, the sooner you start building your future pension. Once you enrol, you can’t opt out.