BCLI Pension Division Report Recommendations Implemented
August 12, 2024
BY Maria Michouris
In 2021, we published a report on pension division after the breakdown of a relationship. This report, created with the assistance of an expert project committee, recommended changes to part 6 of the Family Law Act and the Division of Pension Regulations. In 2023, the Family Law Amendment Act, 2023 was passed, which implemented our recommended reforms to part 6.
Now, earlier this month, an order in council was promulgated which further advances our recommendations by: (1) implementing the recommended reforms for the Division of Pensions Regulation, and (2) setting January 1, 2025, as the date on which these legislative and regulatory reforms will come into force.
These changes will improve family law in BC by ensuring that an important part of its legal framework remains current with changes in pension regulation and with broader social developments.
Highlights from the earlier reforms to part 6 included modernizing the law on:
- locked-in retirement accounts and life income funds;
- private annuities;
- waiving survivor benefits after pension commencement;
- the powers of a personal representative after the death of a spouse;
- commuted value: transfer and calculation;
- disability benefits; and,
- transitions.
Highlights from the newly announced changes to the Division Pensions Regulation include:
- requiring the plan administrator to annually notify a limited member who has not yet received benefits of the earliest date of the limited member’s pension eligibility;
- raising the maximum administrative fee for registering the spouse as a limited member of the plan and for transferring a proportionate share of the member’s defined contribution account to the credit of the spouse;
- revising forms P1-4 and P6-9; and
- repealing form P5.
We extend our gratitude to the Pension Division Review Committee for their hard work and to the Government of British Columbia for incorporating these changes.
