In this edition
What’s new at CAAT
Doing more for your employees with GROWTHplus: Join our employer webinar
The CAAT Pension Plan is launching the GROWTHplus Investment Account, for all eligible Plan members.
GROWTHplus is an additional savings option that allows Plan members to benefit from CAAT’s investment. With GROWTHplus, Plan members can build their savings alongside the secure lifetime pension they have with CAAT. There is no need for additional contributions from participating employers.
Join our upcoming webinar on September 19, 2024 at 11 a.m. EDT to learn how CAAT Plan members can choose to participate in a new savings offering as part of their total rewards package.
During this session, you will learn:
- Details about GROWTHplus, including the attraction and retention benefits for you as an employer
- How information about GROWTHplus will be shared with your employees
- How members can choose to transfer-in funds into GROWTHplus and benefit from CAAT’s investment returns
- Answers to any questions you may have about the new offering
Register here
Thank you for participating in CAAT surveys!
Employer and member input are key to the work CAAT does to provide secure retirement income and improve the number of people with access to a workplace defined benefit pension.
We want to take this opportunity to express our gratitude to everyone who has participated in this year’s annual surveys! Your thoughts and suggestions will help shape CAAT resources and programs and ensure that we can continue to meet your needs as employers and members.
Thank you for being our partner in making retirement better for Canadians.
Visit the new Employer Resources webpage
We are delighted to launch our newly reorganized Employer Resources webpage, with tools and resources to help you highlight the value of the pension you offer to new hires and employees.
Our robust library of downloadable resources lets you help your employees learn about and actively engage with their DB pension:
- Preparing for a new wave of recruitment? Demonstrate the Plan’s value with the Recruitment Toolkit and Candidates’ Page!
- Need to onboard a new member? Use our fact sheets to provide an overview of how the Plan works and what members can expect in their first year.
- Guiding a member through the retirement process? Learn how Retire Online is streamlining the process for employers and members alike.
Bookmark the Employer Resources page today and stay up to date with information on Plan administration and guidance.
Recruitment Toolkit customized sessions
Ready to enhance your recruitment, retention, and total rewards strategy? Did you know that you can request a call with one of our pension experts to support you in leveraging your CAAT pension to attract new job candidates?
During this 30-minute customized session, we will show you how to effectively use the Recruitment Toolkit on your Careers websites, along with other ways you can use the Plan to your advantage.
Book your session today by sending an email to debora@caatpension.ca!
Member learning sessions
At CAAT, we believe that valuing your workplace pension starts with building awareness. We offer customized member learning sessions for employees to provide an opportunity to ask questions and learn about their CAAT pension.
These presentations are delivered by top pension experts, covering a range of topics including:
- Retirement planning
- A future you can count on: Your CAAT pension
- DBprime service purchases
- DBplus pension purchases
They’re perfect for new members who want to know why the defined benefit pension you offer is a big deal, and for any member who wants to make sure they can retire with confidence.
Don’t forget to remind your members to be on the lookout for CAAT’s fall webinar series, kicking off mid-September. These free online sessions are open to everyone and allow members to learn more about pension fundamentals, plan features, retirement planning, and more.
Encourage members to register by including a link to our Presentations page in your employee communications.
Presentations
If you are an employer working with a CAAT administration partner, we highly encourage you to book a customized session for your members. Send in your request today by emailing us at presentations@caatpension.ca.
Updates and reminders
Annual statement wrap-up
2024 has been a very challenging year for statement preparation, mostly due to the additional reviews and data processing needed to accommodate the retroactive pay resulting from the Bill 124 decision. CAAT would like to extend our sincere thanks to all employers for their support during this process.
We ask you to encourage all members to access their annual statements using the member portal, My Pension, and to contact CAAT if they have any questions. By using the portal, members will always have their pension information at their fingertips and have the option to process a pension estimate for a future retirement date.
Annual contribution reconciliations
As part of our year-end and annual statement cycle, CAAT prepares annual contribution reconciliations for all participating employers. Enhancements to our reconciliation process are underway and the final reports will be delivered later than previous years, in Fall 2024.
Upon completing the process to confirm 2023 contribution remittance data and identify any under-/over-payments, CAAT provides you with a report indicating if a refund is due or if there is an amount payable. Any refunds determined through the reconciliation process will need to be taken as a credit on your monthly remittance. If you have an amount payable, submit your payment and report the amount owing on your monthly remittance as soon as possible.
Reporting LTD and workers’ compensation leaves
Read this if… you are an employer offering both DBprime and DBplus
If you work directly with CAAT:
CAAT asks you to review a report of your members who are on long-term disability (LTD) and WSIB leaves of absence once a year. Your employer Pension Analyst sent this report to you via a secure message at the end of July.
Please ensure that the list is current and if you have changes, provide any forms to update a member’s status with the Plan by August 31. We want to ensure that LTD and WSIB leave data is accurate and up to date. If you have any questions, contact your employer Pension Analyst.
If you work with an administration partner:
CAAT does not provide listings of members on LTD or workers’ compensation leave, but we recommend you perform an annual review of members on these types of leave to ensure your leave records are up to date. Please review these members’ status periodically and ensure that you provide notice of retirement three months prior to the member reaching age 65.
Save time when reporting some leaves of absence
Read this if... you are an employer using payroll-based reporting (PBR)
If you are providing CAAT with a member’s leave status in your PBR file, consider the type of leave before you take the added step to complete a leave form via PAL. You are not required to provide CAAT with leave forms in addition to reporting the status in the PBR file, unless it is a long-term disability leave or a workers’ compensation leave.
In those cases, we will need the form to record the member’s decision to contribute or not contribute during the leave. If a member is not making a contribution decision—such as for an unpaid leave—the form is not required.
Termination reporting for OTRFT members
Read this if… you are an Ontario college employer
CAAT asks all college employers to provide a report of all Other Than Regular Full-Time (OTRFT) members who did not contribute to the Plan in the last 12 months. These reports are required three times per year, with October 31, 2024 as the next deadline.
CAAT uses these reports to prepare an EOM notification letter, termination package or retirement package for each member based on their age and the date that their EOM period is ending. We ask you to submit this information via PAL by the end of October.
Portal corner
Read this if: you are an employer who works directly with CAAT and your members have access to My Pension
Retire Online update
Both employers and members are embracing Retire Online—CAAT’s new streamlined option for managing the retirement process. This new feature gives members the ability to elect and manage their retirement options and related documents through the member portal, My Pension. Employers can track the status of these retirements via the employer portal, PAL.
Since the launch, around 30% of all retirement elections have been made using Retire Online. Members clearly appreciate being able to avoid managing paper documents.
Employers also seem enthusiastic based on feedback we’ve received:
“This is very exciting! I am sure this will significantly enhance the retirement process for the members and improve our administrative experience by allowing us to manage and track applications online [via PAL].”
Learn more about Retire Online through our handy fact sheet! We recommend encouraging members to activate their My Pension accounts as soon as possible.
Employer Manual now available in French
Read this if… you are an employer who works directly with CAAT and who uses PAL
In response to requests from employers, CAAT launched the French version of the Employer Manual on July 11.
To access the French version, log into Pension Administration Link (PAL) and select Employer Manual from the left navigation menu. The Manual includes a language selection button on the top right-hand corner. It will always take you to the Welcome page in your selected language.
The Employer Manual will continue to be updated regularly, with new features to help you administer the Plan. Some forms and other resources are currently available only in English, but we expect to publish them in French over the coming months.
If you have any questions about the Employer Manual, please contact your employer Pension Analyst.
2024 planned outages for PAL
PAL will be unavailable for maintenance from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. on the following days:
- August 28
- September 25
- October 23
- November 20
- December 18
We want to hear from you
Have a question, comment or suggestion for us about PAL? Let us know.
Your feedback is important to us. Over the course of this year, we’re planning on adding more exciting features to improve PAL functionality.
PAL is an innovative platform that continues to expand and put information into a single, unified experience for you. Reach out to your Pension Analyst to share your thoughts at any time.
Upcoming events
Mark your calendar for these events. We send invitations straight to your inbox two weeks prior to the event and registration is available on our website.
Quarterly Employer Update—September 24 at 1 p.m.
This webinar will update you about plan news, upcoming events, reminders and more.
Watch your email for an invitation!
Employer education sessions (for employers working directly with CAAT)
- October 3: Leaves and pension purchases
- For employers with DBprime and DBplus—10 a.m.
- For employers with DBplus only—1 p.m.
This training session will review the enrolment requirements based on the provisions of the Plan and the enrolment process.
For recordings of previous sessions, please visit our Employer Education Guide.
Industry outlook: Gain insights from some of the industry’s forward thinkers
Take a closer look at the latest trends, research and insights across the industry. Share with your employees and network!
You can take workplace pensions off your list of things that are broken in Canada
What more can we do to convince people to save for retirement? The answer is nothing. It’s unrealistic to expect households ground down by years of high interest rates and inflation to get more serious about retirement saving, even if it’s imperative that they do so. Maybe workplace pensions can help.
A little more than six in 10 employees are not covered by a pension, so there’s a lot of work to be done in having pensions play a bigger role. But recent developments in the pension world suggest it’s possible. Pension plans are getting smarter about engaging workers, and the number of people covered by these plans is increasing.
Read now
Where benefits costs are rising, and how plan sponsors can manage them
The bad news is, Alecia Henderson doesn’t see any segments of modern benefits plans where costs are coming down in any meaningful way. Instead, the SVP of Benefit Services at NFP sees a wide range of areas where costs are increasing. However, the good news is that she believes there are strategies and trends that plan sponsors now have before them that they can use to manage these rising costs. It just may require a few trade-offs.
Henderson explained that many cost increases in benefits programs are related somewhat to trends exacerbated and accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic and our post-pandemic reality. She highlighted the areas that she believes plan sponsors need to be aware of and noted that, whatever the root cause of these cost increases may be, plan sponsors need to find ways to manage the problems now before them.
Read now