Pensions and Employee Benefits Law Blog 

In May 2023, the Canadian Association of Pension Supervisory Authorities (CAPSA) released a final draft of its Risk Management Guideline for pension plans. Following a consultation and review period, CAPSA released the final version of the Guideline on September 9, 2024.

We strongly recommend that all pension plan administrators carefully review the final version of ...

On November 8, 2023, Bill 33, Pension Benefits Standards Amendment Act, 2023, received Royal Assent. This Bill makes a number of amendments to the Pension Benefits Standards Act (PBSA), including the introduction of variable life benefits for defined contribution pension plans and greater flexibility in the eligibility rules for collectively bargained ...

In recent years, we have seen a noticeable increase in the regulatory focus on risk management to address evolving and growing risks facing pension plan administrators (including cyber security, climate change and investment risks, to name a few):

^[1]

CAPSA Draft Risk Management Guideline

In May 2023, the Canadian Association of Pension Supervisory Authorities (CAPSA ...

On June 6, 2023, the BC Financial Services Authority (BC FSA) issued a new guideline on best practices for multi-employer pension plans (MEPPs).

BC FSA advised in its Advisory 23-025 that the MEPP Best Practices Guideline is aimed at informing administrators and stakeholders of best governance practices of MEPPs registered in B.C. It also sets out BC FSA’s expectations ...

The British Columbia government recently introduced changes to the Family Law Act, including amendments to the rules for pension division on relationship breakdown. These changes are part of Bill 17, which received Royal Assent on May 11, 2023.

Among other things, Bill 17 is intended to modernize and provide greater clarity and guidance with respect to pension division in ...

Last week, the B.C. Government introduced a bill that, if passed, would expand the exceptions to the Pension Benefits Standards Act’s rule against attachment of pension benefits.

Currently, the Pension Benefits Standards Act permits pension benefits to be attached by certain notices and orders made under the Family Maintenance Enforcement Act when a person defaults ...

On December 31, 2022 amendments to B.C.’s Pensions Benefits Standards Regulation came into force. While these amendments primarily address PfAD reform for target benefit plans, they also updated the information that target benefit plans are required to provide to active and retired members in their annual statements.

In particular, the annual statements for active ...

The Pension Benefits Standards Act requires B.C. registered pension plans to conduct triennial plan assessments which assess the administration of a pension plan with respect to compliance with the Act, governance, funding, investment, and the performance of trustees and administrators.

For most pension plans (those with a fiscal year of January to December), the next ...

As part of the Budget Implementation Act, 2021, the federal government announced on November 25, 2022 that Employment Insurance (EI) sickness benefits will be extended from 15 weeks to 26 weeks, effective December 18, 2022.

Employees who qualify and establish a new EI claim on or after December 18 will be eligible for up to 26 weeks of EI sickness benefits and will receive ...

As noted previously on this blog, pension regulators have been working towards increasing guidance for pension plan administrators in relation to protecting pension plan information and records. The BC Financial Services Authority (FSA) issued drafts of its Information Security Guideline and its Outsourcing Guideline, invited consultation, and in October 2021 ...