With a Defined Benefit account, you and your employer put money into a pool and your retirement benefit is calculated using a formula. You can also make contributions to your super in an attached Accumulation account.

Contributions you can make

There are 3 different types of contributions you can make when you have a Defined Benefit account:

Standard contribution 
Standard contributions

(required)

Before tax contribution 
Salary sacrifice before-tax contributions

(optional)

After tax contribution 
Voluntary after-tax contributions

(optional)

Standard contributions

You need to make contributions towards your defined benefit (standard contributions). The default rate is 5% of your superannuable salary.

You can choose to contribute less than 5%, which means you’ll have less when you retire. If you've previously lowered your contribution rate below 5%, you can catch back up later by contributing a percentage of your salary at a higher rate.

Contributing at different rates will affect your multiple, which is a major part of how your final benefit is calculated. The table below shows the different percentage rates of your salary you can contribute and how this grows your multiple. A multiple of 0.210 means 21% of your final salary.

Note that you can only make the higher rates of 6-8% if you are catching up after paying less than 5%.

Your employer may also pay an extra contribution to your Accumulation account, depending on your employment - see the Defined Benefit Guide (PDF) for more information.

Lowering your contribution rate Default Catching up previously lowered rates1
Your contribution 2% 3% 4% 5% 6% 7% 8%
Employer contribution 9.75% 10.75% 11.75% 12.75% 13.75% 14.75% 15.75%
Multiple growth2 0.135 0.160 0.185 0.210 0.235 0.260 0.285

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Police officers have different contribution rates.

Lowering your contribution rate Automatic (default) Catching up previously lowered rates
Your contribution 3% 4% 5% 6% 7% 8% 9%
Employer contribution 12% 14% 16% 18% 20% 22% 24%
Multiple growth 0.140 0.175 0.210 0.245 0.280 0.315 0.350

See the Defined Benefit Account Guide (pdf) for more details on the differences for police officers.

Have a Police account instead? Check our Police Account Guide (pdf) for more information.

You can choose to pay less than the default contribution rate of 5%, down to a minimum of 2%. However, this means your multiple won’t grow as much, so you won’t have as much when you retire.

To lower your standard contributions, ask your payroll office to make this change or give them our Start or Change Regular Contributions to your Super form (pdf).

If you previously reduced your contribution rate, you may be able to catch up and temporarily increase your rate, to make up for the contributions you didn’t pay earlier. Remember that if you lower your contribution rate now and catch up later, your later salary is likely to have increased, so your catch-up contribution would be a percentage of your higher salary. Speak to your payroll office to see how your take-home pay could be affected.

You can't use the catch-up option for when you have been working part-time. It's also not available for times when you’re on leave without pay. But it might be available to you while you’re getting WorkCover benefits.

Contact us for more information.

Salary sacrificing

Salary sacrificing can be tax-effective

Your standard contributions are normally paid using after-tax money, but you could choose to pay them using before-tax money by salary sacrificing. This is when you contribute part of your salary to your super before you pay tax on it, which lowers the amount of salary you pay tax on. This is helpful for people who pay more than 15% in tax.

You should check your contribution limits in the Defined Benefit Guide (pdf) if you have a high salary, because you may already be near or on the limit.

How to salary sacrifice

Speak to your payroll about salary sacrificing your standard contributions. They might advise that your organisation uses RemServ or Smartsalary to process salary sacrifice contributions.

When you salary sacrifice standard contributions, you need to increase the amount you pay because your superannuation contributions are taxed at 15%. This means before-tax contributions of 5% would actually need to be 5.88%.

Voluntary contributions

It’s never too late to give your retirement savings a boost, and anything extra you can add to your super can pay off in the long-term. Any voluntary contributions you make go into an Accumulation account, and you’ll be able to choose how you want your funds invested. This can make an extra part of your retirement nest egg in addition to your Defined Benefit account.

How to make voluntary contributions

Salary sacrifice with payroll

Ask your payroll office how you can set up regular additional contributions by salary sacrificing.

BPAY®

Just use the individual BPAY details listed in Member Online, our app, or your annual statement. If you can’t find them, contact us and we can help.

Cheque or money order

Complete a deposit form and a cheque or money order for the amount you want to deposit.

Visit a Member Centre

You can make contributions in person via EFTPOS at one of our Member Centres.

Voluntary Contributions
Super

Exclusive member benefit

Get advice about making extra contributions to your QSuper account over the phone.

Find out more

®Registered to BPAY Pty Ltd ABN 69 079 137 518.

1. This rate is only available if you have previously paid less than 5% are and 'catching up'.

2. Assumes you are working full-time at full pay for the year. Police officers have different rates.