Walk Through the New Statements

Let's take a step-by-step look at a typical member annual statement.

Your Personal Information

In this section, you'll see your birth date, date of enrolment, earliest possible retirement date, earliest date for an unreduced pension, normal retirement date, and age as of the statement date.

Important point about enrolment date: As HOOPP members often work at more than one employer in their careers, they may have enrolled in HOOPP multiple times. The enrolment date shown in this section is the most recent date you signed up to join HOOPP – your service in the Plan, as you will see, does not necessarily start on this date if you have worked at prior HOOPP employers.

Vesting

The vesting date shown in this section is the date that you became eligible for pension benefits from HOOPP. It's important to remember that the vesting date is just a milestone – your pension benefit will be based on all your service in HOOPP, not just the service you built following the vesting date.

Your Contributions, Earnings and Service

This section will show how much you've contributed to HOOPP, and more importantly, will show your average annualized earnings as of the statement date, as well as your eligibility service and contributory service.

HOOPP retirement pensions are paid using a formula that, when government pension benefits are factored in, provides a pension equal to approximately two per cent of your average annualized earnings for each year of contributory service.

Eligibility service is important if you retire early – the more eligibility service you have, the smaller any early retirement reductions applied to your pension will be.  That results in a bigger pension.

So let's walk through each item in this section.

Beneficiary Designation

This section shows who your beneficiaries are.

Your primary beneficiary is your qualifying spouse, unless spousal benefits have been waived. If your primary beneficiary is your spouse, you can name anyone you wish as your secondary “non-spouse” beneficiary.

If there is no spouse, you can name anyone you wish as primary beneficiary. For details on beneficiary designation, visit our Beneficiary Changes webpage.

Incorrect beneficiary information on your statement?

• In some cases, statements produced and sent in 2007 did not display beneficiary information correctly – even though the correct information on your beneficiary choice was indeed on your pension record. If you would like to confirm that the correct beneficiary is on your record, please contact HOOPP's Client Services team.
• If you recently updated your beneficiary information and it was wrong on your statement, you do not need to update your file again. Please hang on to the letter HOOPP sent to confirm your beneficiary designation, until your beneficiary choices are shown correctly on a future statement.
• Remember that HOOPP will always double check all the beneficiary designation information we've received from you before paying out a benefit
• Unless HOOPP has your qualifying spouse’s name on record, you will receive the statement version for single members. Contact Client Services if you have a spouse, but did not see his or her name on your statement.

Projected Estimated HOOPP Retirement Benefits

As the old movie line goes, “show me the money,” and that's what this section is all about. The first part of this section of the statement explains how all the various component parts of the HOOPP pension formula work.

As well, it shows the assumptions we are using in the statement regarding your service and earnings. Remember that the amounts shown for future retirement dates are estimates only; what you'll get will depend on your actual earnings and service built up to the date you retire.

The statement shows your estimated lifetime pension and early retirement benefits (such as the bridge benefit) for three dates:

• Earliest possible retirement: This is usually age 55 for most people
• Earliest unreduced pension: This is either the date you have 30 years of eligibility service while aged 55 to 59, or the date you reach 60
• Normal retirement: This is your pension as of normal retirement date, age 65. If you are already age 65 on the statement date, your statement will show your benefits on your next birthday

All amounts are shown as monthly amounts before tax. Early retirement benefits, like the bridge, end when you reach age 65; your basic monthly lifetime pension is paid for life. The statement shows what benefits your survivors may be entitled to receive. Visit Survivor Benefits for more information.

Your Options at Termination

This section shows what you'd get if you left HOOPP on the statement date. If you are not vested, you'd get a refund of the contributions you've made to the Plan, plus interest. If you are vested, you'll see a deferred pension amount on your statement, showing what you would receive monthly at age 65.

If you're interested in the size of the pension benefits you can expect to receive based on your service to date – and a deferred pension amount is shown on your statement – there's an easy way to do a ballpark estimate. Let's say that when you're 65, you are expected to live for 20 years. So, multiply the amount shown by 12 (to calculate your annual pension), and then by 20 years. That's how much you'll receive – not including inflation protection -- if you collect a deferred pension starting at age 65 and then live until age 85.

Example: Bill's annual statement shows a deferred pension amount of $728.57 per month. That's $8,742.84 per year. If Bill leaves HOOPP as of the statement date, and then starts collecting his pension at age 65, that's how much he'll receive each year. If he lives until age 85, he will have received at least $174,856.80 in pension payments. Please note that this does not include any potential future inflation adjustments. That's pretty good, considering he only contributed $30,410.27 to HOOPP! And don't forget that if Bill has a surviving spouse, that spouse will receive a monthly lifetime pension equal to 60, 80, or 100 per cent of what Bill was getting.

Commuted value

HOOPP used to show a commuted value on member annual statements. Beginning with statements issued in 2007, the commuted value is no longer shown, for several reasons.

First, a commuted value is struck only if you die before retirement, or if you decide to transfer your benefits out of the Plan when you terminate employment before age 55. The commuted value is a very volatile number and can swing up and down when interest rates change.

For these reasons, the decision was made to show only the pension amounts in the termination section. And remember, HOOPP will pay those pensions, based on our pension formula, regardless of any ups and downs in the investment market or instability in interest rates.

If You Die Before You Retire

The statement provides a brief description of benefits payable to your survivors should you die before retirement. For more details, visit Survivor Benefits.

Benefits on Disability

If you become disabled as defined by HOOPP, are vested and supply qualifying medical evidence, you may be eligible for HOOPP disability benefits. The statement provides a high level description of these benefits, for more details visit the Health & Disability Leave section of the website.

In the Event of a Wind Up

By law, HOOPP is required to explain what would happen if the Plan was to wind up operations.

Summary of Terms

The statement concludes with a Summary of Terms.