TheCable

The National Pension Commission (PenCom) says 1,286 workers withdrew N2.18 billion from the voluntary contributions in their retirement savings account (RSA) between July and September 2020.

This was contained in PenCom’s third-quarter 2020 report (July- September).

“During the quarter under review, the commission granted approval for withdrawal of the sum of N2.18 billion from the voluntary contribution accounts of 1,286 contributors, ” the report read in part.

According to PenCom, 643 of the workers were from the public sector while the remaining 643 worked for private companies.

Employees are allowed to make voluntary contributions into their RSA through their pension fund administrator (PFA) in addition to their mandatory pension contributions to improve their retirement benefits.

The contributory pension scheme (CPS) applies to employees in the public service of the federation, the public service of the federal capital territory (FCT), the public service of the state government, the public service of the local government councils and the private sector.

“Voluntary contributions under these guidelines shall be non-obligatory contributions made by any employee in the formal sector through the employer, ” PenCom said.

“Employees of organisations with less than three employees, as well as self-employed persons as provided in Section 2 (3) of Pension Reform Act 2014 (PRA 2014), shall be covered under the Guidelines for Micro Pensions.”

The commission said an employee must notify his employer in writing of his/her intention to make voluntary contributions and the amount to be deducted from his salary (not more than one-third of the monthly salary) and remitted as voluntary contributions.