Pension Law
The pension law team is led by the director of the firm, who is an experienced attorney and recognised expert in pension law in South Africa. He is an Associate Professor of law at the University of Witwatersrand where he teaches pension law at post-graduate level.
We advise individuals or group members of occupational retirement funds (i.e. pension funds, provident funds, preservation funds and deferred pension funds as well as umbrella funds) and retirement annuity funds on all aspects of their pension rights regarding their contributions and expected benefits. We assist members with the application, interpretation, and implications of the rules of their retirement funds. Where necessary, we assist members with lodging their complaints with the office of the Pension Funds Adjudicator and/or litigating their disputes at the Financial Services Tribunal or the High Court.
We also assist members of the Government Employees Pension Fund who were members of Bantustans or Apartheid government pension funds before 1996. Those whose years of service prior to the establishment of the Government Employees Pension Fund were not considered when their pensionable service was calculated. We provide the following specialised retirement fund related legal services:
- Training and tailor made advice to boards of management of retirement funds, employers, and retirement funds service providers on different regulatory and compliance aspects of pension law. This includes (but not limited to) compliance and risk management; various boards duties including delegation of duties; composition of the boards; collection of contributions; corporate governance; distribution of various benefits such as death, disability, unclaimed, and withdrawal; as well as recent developments in the law.
- Replying and dealing with complaints lodged with and queries from the Office of the Pension Funds Adjudicator.
- Well researched, practical, easy to follow and understand as well-considered legal opinions on different aspects of pension law which members, boards, employers as well as service providers may be confronted, including but not limited to the precise duties of the boards; regulatory compliance; whether certain members or their beneficiaries are entitled to receive certain benefits; withholding of benefits; funds’ obligations to employers, service providers and members; provision of benefits; unclaimed benefits; Regulation 28 and investments of funds’ assets and housing loans as well as challenges that arise when members are engaged in divorce litigation.
Revision and drafting of retirement fund rules
