Will my church marriage certificate suffice?

I have a db pension with mercer which I carried through three public sector employers since 1994. I recently asked for a statement, as I was doing my will, and got the most oddly worded e-mail to say they were under no obligation to give me same. I wrote back to say at retirement age how would they know how to contact anyone! As I have changed address.No reply
 
amtc said:
I have a db pension with mercer which I carried through three public sector employers since 1994. I recently asked for a statement, as I was doing my will, and got the most oddly worded e-mail to say they were under no obligation to give me same. I wrote back to say at retirement age how would they know how to contact anyone! As I have changed address.No reply
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I contacted the JustAsk team at Mercer after receiving a printout from them of my coming pension. I had a few simple questions to ask. That was last August. I have now dealt with 4 different people and the latest person that I sent an email to has also "dumped" me. I now have bits of questions answered, bits of questions ignored, complete questions ignored. Despite them saying at the end of the form that they sent me that if I had any questions I was just to ask.
I think that they are hoping that people will just go away.
 
In my post 14 above I wrote that Mercer were insisting that it was an Irish Regulatory requirement to provide a birth certificate rather than a passport. I said that I was going to query this with the Pension Ombudsman which I did. Now it appears that the Tin God who gave me the above information was wrong and decided to check out the information after insisting that they were right.
This is their latest post on the matter.
"I have contacted our compliance colleagues who have confirmed that the requirement for a birth certificate is in fact a Mercer risk and compliance requirement rather than a regulatory requirement. Our requirement is designed to meet the Trustees obligations. There is a degree of flexibility and if you would like to contact us directly at marketing.ireland@mercer.com, we can work with you to resolve this issue."
 
I ended up sticking in a data protection request. My point was the tone of the email.... That they had no obligation to inform me...pension is from 1994!
 
I think that if you check back through your pension correspondence you will find that you have already provided birth certificates and marriage certificates (if married) when you joined your pension scheme. It would have been a requirement. Why Mercer are again looking for these is beyond me when they already have them on file in their archives.

Maybe they need to look?

I wonder would the Data Protection Commissioner have anything to say about this?

[broken link removed]
 
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Kimmagegirl said:
In my post 14 above I wrote that Mercer were insisting that it was an Irish Regulatory requirement to provide a birth certificate rather than a passport. I said that I was going to query this with the Pension Ombudsman which I did. Now it appears that the Tin God who gave me the above information was wrong and decided to check out the information after insisting that they were right.
This is their latest post on the matter.
"I have contacted our compliance colleagues who have confirmed that the requirement for a birth certificate is in fact a Mercer risk and compliance requirement rather than a regulatory requirement. Our requirement is designed to meet the Trustees obligations. There is a degree of flexibility and if you would like to contact us directly at marketing.ireland@mercer.com, we can work with you to resolve this issue."
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Well done. So what they are saying is it in not an anti-money laundering requirement but a trustee requirement. And that requirement is you have to prove your age. And they weren't accepting a passport as proof of age!!! Nuts.


Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
 
Hi Steven. Thanks for all your replies on the various forums. To think that someone might have believed this individual from Mercer giving out incorrect information. It was your post that made me persevere.

My partner also has an upcoming pension also managed by Mercer and he is going through the same dreadful service that I have had to put up with.

We now have a "Mercer Day" where we deal with them or try to as the case may be. Awful really.
 
Mercer seem interested in the large companies that pay them big fees to run their group pensions. Contact your (ex)employer and tell them that the service from Mercer is appalling and they have no interest in dealing with the members of these schemes as you don't pay Mercer's fees. You therefore want everything to go through your employer as Mercer will deal with the fee payer. The HR dept will also have a direct line to the scheme administrator instead of you phoning up and speaking to a different person every time. You can also remind the scheme trustees that one of their trustee responsibilities is the payment of benefits. This includes where it is outsourced to an administrator ie Mercer. If the payment of benefits is not done in a timely manner, the trustees are in breach of their duty and can be reported to the pensions authority.

Get the employer to fight the battle for you, Mercer will listen to the people who pay the fees.

Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
 
SBarrett said:
Mercer seem interested in the large companies that pay them big fees to run their group pensions. Contact your (ex)employer and tell them that the service from Mercer is appalling and they have no interest in dealing with the members of these schemes as you don't pay Mercer's fees. You therefore want everything to go through your employer as Mercer will deal with the fee payer. The HR dept will also have a direct line to the scheme administrator instead of you phoning up and speaking to a different person every time. You can also remind the scheme trustees that one of their trustee responsibilities is the payment of benefits. This includes where it is outsourced to an administrator ie Mercer. If the payment of benefits is not done in a timely manner, the trustees are in breach of their duty and can be reported to the pensions authority.

Get the employer to fight the battle for you, Mercer will listen to the people who pay the fees.

Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
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Think you are jumping the gun here Steven.
It's entirely reasonable to request a birth/marriage certificate before paying benefits. It is up to the trustees to decide what evidence they require. I don't understand why people are being so difficult about providing a basic document that every person in the country should have in their possession. Plenty of forged passports around and easier to forge that original birth certs. What if the scheme pays out to someone who is not actually of the correct age ? Who will the members look to for compensation then ?
Any delay in payment is being caused by the member not complying with the requirements of the scheme/trustees in terms of documentation, not the trustees.
 
JoeRoberts said:
Think you are jumping the gun here Steven.
It's entirely reasonable to request a birth/marriage certificate before paying benefits. It is up to the trustees to decide what evidence they require. I don't understand why people are being so difficult about providing a basic document that every person in the country should have in their possession. Plenty of forged passports around and easier to forge that original birth certs. What if the scheme pays out to someone who is not actually of the correct age ? Who will the members look to for compensation then ?
Any delay in payment is being caused by the member not complying with the requirements of the scheme/trustees in terms of documentation, not the trustees.
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What you quoted me on is my response re Mercer's service to scheme members. At present, they seem to be ignoring the members completely. They have a dedicated team to deal with members queries and are completely failing in what they are supposed to do.

I don't agree with your argument re forged passports. We're talking group pensions here. The retiree is a member of staff and has probably been one for a long time up to that. We're not talking opening bank accounts to launder money (and if we were, a passport is perfectly acceptable as proof of date of birth ;)).


Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
 
SBarrett said:
What you quoted me on is my response re Mercer's service to scheme members. At present, they seem to be ignoring the members completely. They have a dedicated team to deal with members queries and are completely failing in what they are supposed to do.

I don't agree with your argument re forged passports. We're talking group pensions here. The retiree is a member of staff and has probably been one for a long time up to that. We're not talking opening bank accounts to launder money (and if we were, a passport is perfectly acceptable as proof of date of birth ;)).


Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
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I take your point on Mercer, they are difficult to deal with but in fairness they have a lot of very old schemes and hundreds of thousands of members.
The documentation from employers to scheme admins over the years also leaves a lot to be desired.

I'm a trustee of a number of group schemes and would certainly not pay out based on a passport or church marriage certificate. The responsibility rests with the trustee to take all reasonable steps to satisfy themselves as to the accuracy of data, they should not rely solely on the employer's data. That is a trustee doing the job correctly, however inconvenient it may be for the member.
I've seen far too many errors in employer data re pensions.
 
That's nuts Joe. Governments around the world accept passports as a legitimate form of identification but Irish pension trustees don't?

Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
 
Joe. They were given this documentation when I joined the scheme. O.K. I suppose I could have been divorced and remarried but my date of birth is still the same. If I produce my passport and the date matches with the date they have on file why do they insist on me reconfirming this by producing a new birth certificate.
 
Kimmagegirl said:
Joe. They were given this documentation when I joined the scheme. O.K. I suppose I could have been divorced and remarried but my date of birth is still the same. If I produce my passport and the date matches with the date they have on file why do they insist on me reconfirming this by producing a new birth certificate.
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You may have given them to your your employer when you joined, I've never seen pension schemes requesting or collecting them at joining. Most people join the pension scheme a good period after they start employment, after completing probation/temp contract or reaching a certain minimum age.
What's your objection to getting a new copy of your bc ? As I said, everyone should have one in their possession. It is a basic document for life.
 
JoeRoberts said:
I'm a trustee of a number of group schemes and would certainly not pay out based on a passport or church marriage certificate. The responsibility rests with the trustee to take all reasonable steps to satisfy themselves as to the accuracy of data, they should not rely solely on the employer's data. That is a trustee doing the job correctly, however inconvenient it may be for the member.
I've seen far too many errors in employer data re pensions.
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What is your basis for declining a passport as proof of your date of birth?
 
Bronte said:
What is your basis for declining a passport as proof of your date of birth?
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We don't have a policy to say we decline passports. We have a policy to say we require b cert. I see no need to change it.
No one has ever had any problem producing it.
 
A Birth Certificate would contain more information than is required to confirm a person's date of birth. It also has information on a person's parents, some occupations etc.
 
Update. When I joined my work pension scheme I was using my married name.

Asking me for a birth certificate in my maiden name would have been a waste of time. Different names.

I would then have needed to provide a marriage certificate to confirm change from maiden name to married name.

I have produced my passport in place of the above and it has been accepted.
 
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