In 2003 the industry estimated that a surplus of R80bn was available for distribution.

The Financial Services Board’s (FSB) Deputy Registrar, Jurgen Boyd said, “very little of that money has been distributed to former members.

Provident Funds have stated that the success rate is about 30%. The challenge is that former members do not claim their surplus money.’’

NUMSA has taken a decision to ensure that an equitable distribution of surplus will take place in all the sectors that we organise.

The following has been achieved:

Motor – Motor Industry Fund Administrators (MIFA) has already paid out about R300 million rand to 60 000 former members.

The target is to reach ninety thousand former members.

Auto -The challenge for NUMSA is that the industry does not have one industry fund.

Each company has its own fund, with its own trustees, who in most cases are not shop stewards and are hostile to the union.

These trustees do not have support of Numsa. The trustees deal with actuaries, investment consultants, investment managers and pension lawyers who do not care about union members.

The trustees operate like 1980s liaison committee members, and works councils who were allied to management.

Numsa has identified Ford Motor Company as a pilot company to establish the key issues.

We have instructed our actuaries to study the Ford Surplus scheme which was approved by the FSB in 2009.

Our actuaries are satisfied that the calculations have been properly done, however, there maybe some former members whose years of service, or previous salaries, were not properly counted.

We have requested Ford shopstewards and former committee members to scrutinize member statements and if should they find any fault, we will then go back to the fund actuaries to recalculate.

An amount of ten million rand has been set aside to pay those who were underpaid.

Former members of Ford Pension Fund may contact shop stewards, Numsa local office or Ford former member committee at 0791531131.

Metal and engineering – Cde Mathenjwa, a former member representative said, “only 100 000 members have contacted the Mibfa call centre and yet we were hoping that we will reach about five hundred former members.

We will be approaching Mibfa to set up a tracing facility in the SADC region as well as the rural areas.’’

The surplus Apportionment Act allows employers to get a portion of the surplus however NUMSA is negotiating that all the surplus must be paid to worker’s retirement benefit.

Currently the contribution to the fund is only six percent from employers and six percent from workers which is too little for workers to have a comfortable retirement.

Recent research from the FSB has shown that for workers to have a comfortable retirement he/she must contribute at least twenty four percent of their earnings.

In his presentation, Comrade Mathenjwa concluded by saying that by the end of July MIBFA will issue every member and former member with a booklet which will explain everything about the metal and engineering surplus apportionment.

New Tyre Manufacturing – The situation differs from one company to the other, however Numsa has given the shopstewards forms to fill in.

The forms have to be returned to Numsa so see if we should intervene or not.

Stages in allocating the surplus:

Stage one
The fund appoints an evaluator to determine whether there is a surplus or not.

Stage two: If there is a surplus, the value has to be determined.

Stage three: The trustees must endorse the value – whether there is a surplus or not.

Stage four: The fund must advertise in the media that is accessible to all former members

Stage five: After 3 months of advertisement the trustees, with the assistance of an actuary, must allocate money to former members, employers and current members.

Members are given 3 months to object if they’re not satisfied

Stage six: The fund must take that whole report, called the Scheme, and submit it to the FSB.

Stage seven: The FSB will scrutinize the Scheme, and if they are satisfied they will approve the Scheme for payment.

Stage eight: Payment/distribution of surplus takes place

Source
Numsa News No 2