Partial liquidation of the GPS at December 31, 2003
Change of address
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Status of the partial liquidation as of 18 August 2008
Zurich, 18. August 2008 - At the start of May, we received an answer from the Swiss Federal Administrative Court to our enquiry as to when the proceedings will begin; not until spring 2009. As a result, the GPS filed a request for priority handling with the relevant authorities.
In the meantime, the Federal Administrative Court wrote us confirming that we can expect a decision sometime this year.
We hope to get the ruling by the end of 2008. The decision of the Federal Administrative Court can be appealed to the Federal Supreme Court. If no further legal action is taken, the GPS could pay out the surplus available from the partial liquidation in the near future.
As soon as a valid judgement has been passed, we will write to all involved regarding the next steps.
Status of the partial liquidation as of 1 May 2008
Zurich, 01.05.2008 - We made an enquiry at the Federal Administrative Court about the progress of the objections. According to the relevant office, the five remaining appeals will not be heard until spring 2009. The reason for the delay is due to understaffing at the court, and not least due to the large number of court cases regarding the 5th IV revision.
Of course we hope that the court will be able to hear the objections this year still. However, we must mention once again that the decision of the court may be appealed, which would cause further delays in the payment of the available surplus.
As soon as a valid judgement has been passed, we will write to all involved regarding the next steps.
Partial liquidation update - December 1, 2007
As you may recall, we informed you on July 12 that the GPS had asked the Swiss Federal Administrative Court to revoke the suspension of the partial liquidation process which was then in force. The Court wrote to us on September 4 confirming that this had been done.
This means that the Court can now deal with the five remaining objections to the partial liquidation proposed. Any rulings here could still be referred to the Federal Supreme Court, however. So it is still impossible to say when the freely-disposable funds concerned might be paid out.
Status of the partial liquidation as of July 12, 2007
Zurich, July 12, 2007 - With the Swiss Federal Supreme Court having ruled on April 17 to reject the claim against the GPS in respect of the Flight Attendants Fund, the identical claims to the one rejected have now been withdrawn, paving the way for the partial liquidation to proceed. The GPS has already applied to the Swiss Federal Administrative Court to have the present suspension of the partial liquidation process revoked. As soon as this is done, the Federal Administrative Court will be able to deal with the five remaining objections to the partial liquidation proposed. But, as we informed you in our update of June 10, any rulings here by the Federal Administrative Court could be referred to the Federal Supreme Court, too.
Status of the partial liquidation as of June 10, 2007
Zurich, June 10, 2007 - As previously communicated, a number of former Swissair flight attendants have lodged claims against the GPS in connection with the Flight Attendants Fund. Two of these claims were dealt with and rejected last year by the Canton Zurich Social Security Court. But one of the plaintiffs concerned elected to appeal against the court’s decision to the Federal Supreme Court. On April 17, the Federal Supreme Court also rejected this claim against the GPS on all points. You will find further details of this development in our "News" section.
As soon as all the claims lodged against the GPS in connection with the Flight Attendants Fund have been dealt with, we can apply to the Swiss Federal Administrative Court (formerly the Federal Appeals Commission) to revoke the present suspension of the partial liquidation process. This would enable the court to resume processing the further objections to the partial liquidation proposed. Any rulings here, however, could also be referred to the Federal Supreme Court - a move which would regrettably further delay the distribution of the freely-disposable funds concerned.
New office premises and new phone/fax numbers from June 1
Zurich, May 30, 2007 – Pension Fund Services AG (PFS AG), which administers the General Pension Scheme of the SAirGroup (GPS), moves to new business premises in Glattbrugg on June 1. The new office address is: PFS AG, Sägereistrasse 20, CH-8152 Glattbrugg.
The postal address for the partial liquidation of the GPS remains unchanged as:
General Pension Scheme of the SAirGroup, Partial Liquidation, P.O. Box, CH-8058 Zurich Airport.
| Your new phone and fax contact numbers from June 1 onwards: | |||
| Main number: | Phone: 043 210 18 18 | Fax: 043 210 18 19 | |
| Customer adviser: | Ms. R. Geisseler | Phone: 043 210 18 43 | E-mail: ruth.geisseler@pfs.ch |
Status of the partial liquidation on March 15, 2007
Zurich, March 15, 2007 - As we informed you on November 25 2006 last, one claim lodged against the GPS relating to the Flight Attendant Fund has now been referred to the Federal Insurance Court. You will find more details of the background to this claim in the „News” section on our home page.
There is no point in dealing with the remaining objections to the partial liquidation proposed by the GPS until the Federal Insurance Court has made its final ruling on this claim relating to the Flight Attendant Fund. We expect this to take a number of years. In view of this, the GPS has requested that the treatment of the remaining objections to the partial liquidation proposed be suspended until the flight attendants' claim has been resolved. This request was granted last month by the relevant court.
Status of the partial liquidation on November 25, 2006
Zurich, November 25, 2006 - The Social Security Court in Winterthur has clearly rejected the complaints lodged against the GPS in connection with the Flight Attendant Fund. Despite this, however, an administrative court appeal has been lodged against this ruling with the Federal Insurance Court in Lucerne. The partial liquidation cannot proceed until this appeal has been dealt with.
Even if this appeal is rejected, the Federal Appeals Commission will still have to deal with five remaining objections to the partial liquidation order. Since any ruling by the Commission can still be referred to the Federal Supreme Court, it could be another two to three years before a final legal ruling is made and we can pay out the freely-disposable funds.
In view of the length of time that may still elapse until such payments can be made, many people have been asking whether interest is accumulating on these freely-disposable funds. While the GPS is under no legal obligation to pay such interest, the Board of Trustees will conduct a further thorough discussion of the interest payment issue before such funds are paid out. The earnings accrued on these funds (which have been invested in risk-free vehicles) and the costs arising from such investments will have a major influence on whether any interest can be paid on your share of these freely-disposable funds.
As soon as a final legal ruling is available, we will write to all the individuals concerned again. For the moment, apart from informing us of any change of address, there is no need for any action on your part.
Status of the partial liquidation on May 30, 2006
Zurich, May 30, 2006 - A total of 12 complaints have been lodged with the Winterthur Social Security Court against the GPS in connection with the Flight Attendant Fund.
While these actions are not directly connected with the partial liquidation, they do involve substantial monetary claims against the GPS. And, even though the GPS believes that there is little chance of their success, it would be irresponsible to pay amounts out from the scheme’s freely-disposable funds under the partial liquidation before these claims are settled.
The GPS therefore submitted a formal request to the Federal Appeals Commission in Lausanne on May 11 asking it to suspend the present partial liquidation objections processing procedure until these other claims have been settled. The GPS regrets this further delay in the partial liquidation, and hopes that the claims concerned can be settled by the courts as quickly as possible.
Status of the partial liquidation on February 20, 2006
Zurich, February 20, 2006 - A total of 144 objections to the order issued by the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office regarding the partial liquidation of the GPS have been lodged with the Federal Appeals Commission for Occupational Old Age, Survivors’ and Disability Pension Affairs in Lausanne.
These objections have been made on a number of issues. Most of them are against the collective transfer of freely-disposable funds to former insurees’ new occupational pension schemes. Others are seeking the abolition of the deadline to relay such funds, and a few are opposed to the distribution plan.
The GPS and the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office will now separately state their views on each of these objections and submit them to the Federal Appeals Commission by March 31.
The Federal Appeals Commission will then process these objections from April 1 onwards. Needless to say, it is currently impossible to say when the Commission might reach its final decision. But we do expect it to be some time before the freely-disposable funds concerned can be paid out.
As soon as those objections with suspensive effect have been dealt with and we have a legally-valid order, we will write again to everyone involved. In view of this, please be sure to keep us informed of any change of address.
Status of the partial liquidation on December 21, 2005
Zurich, December 21, 2005 - The December 7 deadline by which objections to the order issued by the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office had to be lodged has now passed. The Swiss Federal Appeals Commission in Lausanne has so far sent us copies of 127 such objections.
The GPS and the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office will now submit their own views on each of these objections to the Swiss Federal Appeals Commission. In view of the large number of objections received, they will be seeking to have the deadline for doing so extended to March 31, 2006.
In the meantime, in addition to and independently of the present partial liquidation process, numerous complaints have been lodged against the GPS and the Winterthur Social Security Court with regard to the Flight Attendant Fund.
Freely-disposable funds cannot be released and transferred under the partial liquidation of the GPS until all the objections and complaints with suspensive effect have been settled in legal terms.
Status of the partial liquidation on October 31, 2005
Zurich, October 31, 2005 - The official order from the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office regarding the partial liquidation of the GPS has now been received, and was sent on to the 24’000 individuals involved at the end of October by first-class mail. The order - which is only available in German - will also be found under „Downloads” in PDF format.
Please continue to inform us of any changes of address (online if possible), so that we can keep you informed of further developments in the partial liquidation process.
Click here to inform us of any change of your address.
Status of the partial liquidation on June 10, 2005
Zurich, June 10, 2005 – As we informed you here at the end of January, the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office commissioned an independent specialist body in consultation with the GPS Board of Trustees to support the partial liquidation process.
The specialists – attorney Dr. Hermann Walser and pension fund expert Dr. Claude Chuard – were asked to appraise the partial liquidation and the decisions taken by the Board of Trustees. They also assessed the GPS’s reserves at December 31, 2003 and the proposed distribution plan in view of the special circumstances surrounding the partial liquidation and the objections that had been received.
The specialists presented their findings to the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office and the GPS Board of Trustees at the end of May. You will find a PDF version of their report (in German) in our „Downloads” section.
The specialists conclude in their report that the decisions taken by the Board of Trustees comply with the law and are sensible, fair and balanced towards all 24 000 individuals affected. The only recommendation they make relates to persons who transferred collectively to a new occupational pension scheme and left (or will leave) the new scheme again by June 30, 2005.
For these persons, care will be taken to ensure that any freely-disposable funds to which they are entitled from the GPS are passed on to them individually.
This is because Point 4 of the „Agreement on the Collective Transfer of Freely-Disposable Funds” stipulates that insurees whose new occupational pension scheme cannot allocate funds on the basis of a collective transfer shall be entitled to the individual distribution of the freely-disposable funds concerned. A PDF version of the „Agreement on the Collective Transfer of Freely-Disposable Funds” is also available (in German) in our „Downloads” section.
Comments on the specialists’ report can be submitted between now and June 28, 2005. Please send any such comments by post or e-mail to the Board of Trustees (e-mail: ruth.geisseler@pfs.ch, postal address: GPS, Partial Liquidation, P.O. Box, 8058 Zurich Airport). We will pass your comments on to the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office and the specialist body.
Once the deadline for comments has expired, we expect to receive an order from the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office. This order will be sent to all the persons affected (around 24 000). Appeals may also be lodged against this order.
The Board of Trustees is keen to see the partial liquidation of the GPS brought to a speedy conclusion. And it is convinced that the specialist body’s report provides a further sound foundation for the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office to issue a corresponding order in the near future.
Status of the partial liquidation on January 25, 2005
Zurich, January 25, 2005 - As we informed you on our website, the GPS Board of Trustees finalised the distribution plan for the scheme's partial liquidation at its meeting on September 23, 2004. It then submitted this to the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office for the official approval of the supervisory authorities.
Subsequent discussions between the Office and the Board of Trustees suggested that, in view of the exceptional complexity involved, the appointment of a neutral specialist body seemed to be the best way to proceed. This specialist body will be issued with a clear and comprehensive commission to assess the entire partial liquidation, paying due and full regard to all the objections which have been submitted so far and also to the distribution plan proposed. This approach should ensure that a solution can be reached which is as fair and balanced as possible.
Dr. H. Walser, an attorney and a specialist in BVG Swiss occupational pension scheme law, has been asked by the Office to head this specialist body. A further specialist, Dr. C. Chuard, has also offered his services. If accounting specialists are also required, these will be separately commissioned by the body for their work.
The GPS Board of Trustees hopes that, with the appointment of this independent specialist body, a solution can be found that meets with broad acceptance and permits it to conclude the partial liquidation in the near future.
Status of the partial liquidation on December 22, 2004
For more details, please read the German or French version.
Status of the partial liquidation on September 23, 2004
Zurich, September 23, 2004 - After various contacts with the Occupational Pension Fund Office of the Canton of Zurich, once again the boards of the foundations have been intensively occupied with the partial liquidation during its meeting on August 26, 2004. Again the plan of distribution was discussed. At the September 23, 2004 meeting the boards of the foundations conclusively decided on the plan of distribution and will now submit it to the Pension Fund Office for approval.
The boards of the foundations would like to conclude APK’s partial liquidation in foreseeable time. Therefore, the allocated assets to be distributed have been invested in liquid assets. The boards of the foundations hope that the Pension Fund Office will approve the plan of distribution as soon as possible and will issue a corresponding formal order. At issuance of the Pension Fund Office formal order, an informational letter, as well as the formal order, will be sent to everyone affected by the partial liquidation.
However, it must be assumed that this formal order will be contested. A disbursement may be made only if the claims have been settled or their suspensive status has ceased and the formal order thus has become binding. In the worst case, as in an appeal to the Federal Court, the disbursement of the free assets will presumably be delayed by several years.
Status of the partial liquidation on June 30, 2004
Zurich, June 30, 2004 - The Board of Trustees continues to work to ensure a fair and balanced solution for the partial liquidation of the GPS. The views and expectations of the various parties involved are still widely divergent, however, and a compromise is proving difficult to find. New proposals have now been submitted to the Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office; and we expect to receive the Office’s response to these by mid-July.
Information event for objections to the partial liquidation procedure
An information event was held on May 12 for the beneficiaries and pension schemes that have lodged written objections to the proposed implementation provisions for the planned partial liquidation. The event included a presentation which answered many of the questions and objections raised. The presentation (which is in German) can be downloaded here.
„Reserves for remaining insurees” calculations
In addition to the actuarial reserves required to pay the pensions of remaining insurees, the partial liquidation also needs to calculate the so-called „reserves for remaining insurees”, i.e. the funds required to ensure the retirees-only scheme’s financial stability in the medium and long term. The Board of Trustees has commissioned three independent institutions to calculate these „reserves for remaining insurees”. Their results can be found under „Teilliquidation” in the German section of our website.
Information for beneficiaries
Our beneficiaries were informed about the procedure envisaged for the planned partial liquidation of the GPS in February 2004. The information circular is also available in German and French. Download
Information for the new pension schemes
Zurich January 22, 2004 - A presentation was made to the boards of trustees of the new occupational pension schemes on January 21. All beneficiaries will receive further details directly in a circular letter which will be distributed in mid-February. Download (in German only)
Consultation procedure for proposed partial liquidation
Zurich October 20, 2003 - The following letter was sent to the occupational pension schemes and the unions concerned. It is being presented to individual beneficiaries for information purposes only. Download
Starting point
In view of the sale of various former SAirGroup companies and the consequent departure of several groups of insurees, consideration was given at the end of 2001 to effecting a partial liquidation of the GPS, VeF and KV pension schemes. A partial liquidation means that, in addition to their vested benefits, any individual or group of individuals leaving a pension scheme are also entitled to a portion of the scheme’s freely-disposable funds. The GPS Board of Trustees approved a corresponding regulation on January 17, 2002 covering all persons leaving the scheme between October 1, 2001 and June 30, 2002.
Subsequent developments
The basic situation has changed, however, since the beginning of the year:
- The partial liquidation regulations, which envisaged different reference dates for the payment calculations concerned, were based on the assumption that the GPS’s assets would remain relatively stable. This is no longer the case: the GPS, like many other Swiss-based pension schemes, had incurred negative year-to-date returns on its investments up to August 2002, a trend which has naturally eroded the scheme’s reserves.
- Just under a year after the collapse of the SAirGroup, it is now becoming clear that the large majority of the companies and employees affected will be changing from the GPS to their new pension schemes in an orderly manner - which is not the scenario envisaged for partial liquidations under Swiss pension scheme law.
- We can now assume that all working insurees within the GPS will have found a new provident care solution by the end of 2003. At the same time, studies conducted by our own insurance specialists have shown that the Board of Trustees will best protect the interests of its retirees by administering the GPS as a retirees’ pension scheme from January 1, 2004.
New resolution to ensure totally equal treatment for all beneficiaries
The paramount mission of the Board of Trustees is to ensure equal treatment of all its active insurees and retirees. Needless to say, this extends to the present situation, too. In view of the trends described above and the fact that the event which would trigger the partial liquidation of the GPS - i.e. the collapse of the SAirGroup - is the same for all insurees and retirees, the Board of Trustees resolved on September 5 that:
- The partial liquidation resolution of January 17, 2002 should be rescinded, cancelling the partial liquidation scheduled for 2002.
- The partial liquidation of the GPS would be more meaningfully effected at the time the scheme is transformed into a retirees’ pension scheme. Since this is expected to be December 31, 2003, this should be the reference date for calculating the scheme’s reserves. The partial liquidation will apply to all those individuals who are or were insured under the GPS between October 1, 2001 and the reference date specified for calculating the scheme’s reserves.
- The Zurich Cantonal Occupational Pension Fund Office will be notified of the above.
Legal basis
In view of the many corporate restructurings that the business world has seen in recent years (mergers, liquidations, extensive layoffs and corporate reorganisations), the Swiss Federal Law on Vested Benefits in Occupational Old Age, Survivors’ and Disability Benefit Plans („Freizügigkeitsgesetz”), which came into effect on January 1, 1995, made special provisions (under its Article 23) for these developments and their repercussions for the occupational pension schemes involved.
What is a „partial liquidation”?
A „partial liquidation” is designed to ensure that, when major corporate changes of the kind mentioned above are made, affecting a large number of a pension scheme’s insurees, those insurees can not only take out their full vested benefits if they have to leave the scheme, but are also entitled to part of the scheme’s „freely-disposable funds” - the capital the scheme owns in excess of what is needed to cover its current and future benefit obligations, plus appropriate provisions and equalisation reserves.
Procedure
The Board of Trustees will determine the official date on which a partial liquidation is to be effected, in consultation with the supervisory authorities. The scheme will then establish its exact financial situation on this date. This will involve drawing up a commercial and an actuarial balance sheet. The Board of Trustees will then issue a set of „implementation provisions” on how the partial liquidation is to be effected. It is then up to the supervisory authorities to decide whether the conditions required for a partial liquidation are actually met and, if they are, how the corresponding part of the scheme’s freely-disposable funds should be distributed among the insurees concerned.