Thursday, March 19, 2009
7 comments:
Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."
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What's the word on merger?
ReplyDeleteTo expand on Linda Hildebrand concerns about the pension plan:
ReplyDeleteAt the APP in Aug. 1995, I was given a one-page summary of my pensions benefits through 12/31/94. It had two parts: Under the heading "YOUR CASH BALANCE BENEFIT, it listed my "allocation for 1994". Under "YOUR GRANDFATHERED BENEFIT, it read: "Your Basic Grandfathered Benefit is (my amount) per month beginning at normal retirement and calculated as a single life annuity." It also said that, based on service, I was 100% vested in the Grandfathered Benefit as of 12/31/94.
I also have the booklet distributed to APP employees in January 1994, when the Cash Balance Plan began. On page 21, under the heading "Protection of Prior Pension Plan Accruals, it says: "The Prior Pension Plan benefits you have earned through December 31, 1993 are protected. This means that they cannot be reduced or taken away." It also says: "Prior Pension Plan benefits will not be converted to cash balances when the new Cash Balance Retirement Plan provisions become effective."
I know at least one former APP employee who left before 12/31/93 who gets a monthly check from Northern Trust under the Prior Pension Plan.
Correct.
ReplyDeleteThe cash balance account transferred to Gannett.
The question is where do we file for the grandfathered amount? I don't believe that was ever transferred to Gannett.
That would be news to Gannett, 3:30 PM, but this question is one reason I put in a call asking for Don or Jules to check their records and talk to me about this. So far, Press Communications also is ignoring me. So, now I'm making this plea more public.
ReplyDeleteI started with the Press in 1987. The pension calculations I requested and received recently show Gannett offers to pay all my pension benefits back to 1987 based on the Cash Balance Plan formula.
The Grandfathered Plan I was vested in up until 1994 was ignored, completely. The Cash Balance Plan SPD, in "Protection of Prior Pension Plan Accruals" confirms what both of you say and also confirms the Grandfathered, like the Cash Balance, can be taken either in lump sum or annuity.
My pension from 1987 through 1997 is calculated as 21.67 percent of current salary, because that was the percentage of my 1997 salary in cash Gannett took from my Cash Balance Plan account. Yet, that pension plan covered only my years 1994-1997.
Carrie Oman replied to me that all prior APP pension money was merged into Gannett's pension plan that started in 1998, but, as I said, I don't know if she is a privileged source for that information -- and Roxanne Horning will not answer me.
That reminds me of another alert I wanted to post. That 21.67 percent is inaccurate, too. It's not my 1997 salary and it's not my average of the last five years' salary, as Gannett contends.
I can reach that calculation only if I add my last five years of salary including thousands in "appreciation award" that Don and Jules gave us in 1997. Remember people posting here were trying to recall what that money was for? I found the letter than arrived with the checks, and I found my pay stubs. It was not "salary, overtime or compensation," which the SPD says are supposed to be the basis for the salary calculations. I don't think the appreciation awards can be rightly averaged in as salary, yet because the checks were taxable income, that's exactly what Gannett appears to be doing. I wonder if they are even aware they are cheating us there.
APP old-timers need to really need to question and check what Gannett is doing with these pension calculations.
Sorry, I hit the publish button instead of preview and didn't edit my post. You probably can figure out my typos.
ReplyDeleteTo clarify as to how Gannett came up with my 21.67% "transition percentage," it appears Gannett averaged all income I paid taxes on for my five prior years as of 1997 -- meaning Jan. 1, 1993, through Dec. 31, 1997.
The fact the Cash Balance Plan didn't even exist during the first year Gannett uses for that calculation makes the formula some mystery "actuary" came up with all that much more ludicrous, doesn't it?
I'm beginning to question whether Northern Trust Bank is a competent trustee.
There are federal reporting requirements. Both the current Gannett and APP Cash Balance SPDs promise each of us will get annual updates of our pension, which is what a pension rights guy also told me is required.
Do you two have anything ever sent by Gannett to update you on your pension funds since 1998? I can't find that I ever received anything. When I asked, Oman replied that the law doesn't require it, so Gannett doesn't give annual updates to us, only to the federal ERISA.
Hmmmm. And the Northern Trust trustee never questioned that discrepancy?
From June 26, 2008, letter from Roxanne Horning to APP and HNT employees:
ReplyDelete"Your frozen benefit amount has two parts -- what you earned before the properties joined Gannett on 1997 and what you earned from 1998 forward. That first part was merged with the Gannett plan and you will be entitled to any benefit you may have earned before 1998.
Horning's letter says "on 1997," without a day or month? Not "in 1997"?
ReplyDelete