No, there is no difference in the amount of funds allocated and paid as pension and disability insurance contributions by companies for the PDIF insured persons and the ones who are members of one of the Mandatory Pension Funds in the Second Pillar.
The main difference between the old pension system and membership in the first two pension pillars is actually in the distribution of pension and disability insurance contributions.
For persons who are not members of any Second Pillar Mandatory Pension Fund, the entire pension and disability insurance contribution in the amount of 18,8% of the gross salary is paid into PDIF, while for the members of the Second Pillar Mandatory Pension Fund, 12,8% of the gross salary is paid into PDIF, and 6% of the gross salary is paid into the Mandatory Pension Fund chosen by the insured person.
If the Company goes bankrupt, the assets on the accounts of Mandatory Pension Fund’s members shall not be lost – they shall remain on the accounts of Fund members with the Custodian Bank, while the Agency for Supervision of Fully Funded Pension Insurance shall, within the shortest possible period, carry out a procedure to find another adequate company that will manage the Mandatory Pension Fund.
With the membership in the Voluntary Pension Fund within the Third Pension Fund, you save regardless of the pension in the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund of the Republic of North Macedonia.
With an individual membership in the Voluntary Pension Fund, you save regardless of the pension in the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund of the Republic of North Macedonia and you get the following benefits:
Payment of funds – the funds from the voluntary capital financial pension insurance can be withdrawn at least 10 years before the age required for acquiring the right to an old-age pension, i.e. 54 for men and 52 years for women. The member decides on the method of payment of the funds.
Companies can enjoy a range of benefits by organizing a pension scheme within the Voluntary Pension Fund, such as:
Income tax benefits for contributions to a pension scheme:
Expenses on the basis of a paid contribution to the voluntary pension fund in one calendar year are tax-recognized expenses from the point of view of the Profit Tax, in the amount of up to two average monthly gross salaries, paid in the previous year in the Republic of North Macedonia.
According to the Personal Income Tax Law, when paying a pension benefit from the voluntary pension fund, the basis for calculating the tax is:
You can make the payment of funds into the Voluntary Pension Fund yourself or a third person can make the payment on your behalf and for your account. Certainly, the payer must be known, i.e. sign your Agreement for Membership in KB First Open Voluntary Pension Fund as a payer.
Yes, there is a possibility to join KB First Open Voluntary Pension Fund through the company where you work.
Your company can make a contract for an occupational pension scheme which will also include you, and pay on your behalf funds for additional pension insurance to your personal – professional account.
The KB First Open Voluntary Pension Fund membership through your company’s participation in an occupational pension scheme allows you to use the same rights as for the individual membership, except the right to income tax return and voluntary contribution payment (voluntary contribution payments for any participant in an occupational pension scheme can be made solely by the employer – insurer).
Find out if your company has an occupational pension scheme.
Occupational pension schemes enable additional collective pension insurance organized and financed by companies or citizens’ associations. The organization and financing of occupational pension schemes primarily means caring for the future and providing a higher standard of living after retirement of companies’ employees/members. The funding of occupational pension schemes may, or need not be an additional cost to the companies, which can keep their costs at the planned level by an adequate allocation of their financial resources, while generating additional income for their employees.
The occupational pension scheme is a way to pay voluntary pension insurance contributions agreed between the employer and its employees or the citizens’ association and its members, included in the Voluntary Pension Fund.
More employers or several citizens’ associations can organize and fund occupational pension schemes together.
The employer shall adopt rules regarding the occupational pension scheme and sign an agreement organizing and financing the occupational pension scheme with the company it has selected to manage the Voluntary Pension Fund where the occupational pension scheme will be included. The employer may determine which employees or members can participate in the occupational pension scheme, the amount of payment made for each of them, the frequency of payments etc.
If the Company goes bankrupt, the assets on the accounts of Voluntary Pension Fund’s members shall not be lost – they shall remain on the accounts of Fund members with the Custodian Bank, while the Agency for Supervision of Fully Funded Pension Insurance shall, within the shortest possible period, carry out a procedure to find another adequate company that will manage the Voluntary Pension Fund.
Any Pension Fund is always managed by a certain Pension Company, similar to Investment Funds. In accordance with legislation, one Pension Company may manage the assets of one Mandatory Pension Fund, one Voluntary Pension Fund or one Mandatory and Voluntary Pension Fund.
The Fund consists of funds paid by its members upon the collection of fees, increased by the yield on their investment.
Owners of Pension Funds are their members, while the assets of Funds are completely segregated from the assets of the Company that manages them, and they are kept safely at the Custodian Bank.
Pension Companies are legal entities, i.e. joint stock companies whose core business is to manage Pension Funds’ assets operationally and strategically.
Basically, the method of operation of either Mandatory or Voluntary Fully Funded Pension Funds is the same – Pension Funds’ assets are invested in accordance with the relevant laws and regulations, while the overall yield earned from such investments is attributable to the members of the respective Fund.
It is important to highlight that employment is a prerequisite for payment of funds to personal accounts of Mandatory Pension Funds’ members, and the amount of contributions for the Second Pension Pillar paid to individual accounts of the Second Pillar Mandatory Pension Funds’ members is 6% of their gross wage.The funds paid to the Mandatory Pension Fund are not an additional cost for the member or the company where he/she works, but the word goes about the allocation of funds paid into the mandatory pension insurance system, i.e. funds paid before the reform of the pension system.
The payment of funds to personal accounts of Voluntary Pension Funds’ members means payment of members’ personal assets, third parties paying on behalf and for the account of members or companies where members work. Because of this, Voluntary Pension Fund membership is not directly linked to, or conditioned by employment.
Certainly, there are other important specifics/differences defined by laws and regulations relating to membership possibilities, securities in which assets of individual Funds can be invested, investment limits, ways of using such assets etc.
Assets on the personal accounts of members of the Fully Funded Pension Funds from the Second and Third Pillar are recorded in accounting units. An accounting unit represents the member’s proportionate share in the total net value of either the Mandatory or Voluntary Pension Fund.
Example:
All new payments into the Fund shall be converted into accounting units, such that the amount paid shall be divided by the value of the Fund’s accounting unit, at the date of payment. The accounting unit’s value changes every day.
Example:
The accounting unit’s value shall be obtained such that the total net value of the Pension Fund shall be divided by the total number of accounting units of all members of the relevant Fund. It is calculated on a daily basis and it depends on several factors: the yield from individual investments, the price movement of securities in which assets of the Mandatory Pension Fund are invested, exchange rates, etc.An accounting unit of 105.00 shows that the yield of the Fund until such period was 5%, compared to the initial value of the accounting unit of 100.00.
The value of your assets represents the number of accounting units you own multiplied by the value of the accounting unit at the date of valuation.
Your future pension from the Pension Fund of the Second or Third Pillar largely depends on the accounting unit’s value.
For example, if the value of the Pension Fund’s accounting unit at the beginning of your membership was 100.00 units, and it was continuously growing in the years of your membership in the Fund, where the value of the accounting unit at the date of your retirement was 140.00 units, you would have as much money on your account as you had accounting units at the date of retirement multiplied by 140.00 as the value of the accounting unit at the date of your retirement.
Example:
Hence, the higher the value of the accounting unit, the more money you have in your account.