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Reading your Defined Benefit account statement

Superannuation

18 August 2022 5 min read

With a Defined Benefit account, feel good about your super today, knowing you'll receive a defined benefit later. Here are 7 things to check when you receive your 2022 Defined Benefit Super Statement.

1

Check your personal details

The personal details section on your statement contains the following:

Your client number, which is unique to you
Your tax file number (TFN). Make sure we have this on file. If we do, it will say “supplied”.

Check whether you’re registered for Member Online. It’s the easiest way to keep up-to-date with your investment performance, income payments and account balance.

Finally, check your email address and postal address. You can make any changes quickly and easily in Member Online.

2

Check your account balance

Your annual statement will also show your opening balance at the beginning of the financial year (or the date your account was opened), compared with your closing balance at the end of the financial year.

Depending on your circumstances, this could include a Defined Benefit account balance, a Deferred Retirement Benefit account balance, an Accumulation account balance, or a combination of these. Take note of your total account balance – it is tallied at the bottom of the table.

With regards to your Defined Benefit component, note that prior to this year your statement showed both your salary for the financial year just finished as well as your salary for the new financial year. Your salary for the new financial year is no longer shown and it’s important to note that this change does not impact your defined benefit entitlements at all.

To see the latest estimate of how much you’ll get, or a projection of how much you may get when you retire, you can log in to Member Online at any time.

3

Check your beneficiaries

You can nominate a beneficiary to let us know who you would like to receive your super of the worst should happen.

If we have a beneficiary on file, your statement will say “nominated”. If you’ve made a binding death benefit nomination, details will be shown in your transaction summary.

You can find out more about binding death benefit nominations, or renew your nomination at any time in Member Online under ‘Profile’ then ‘Beneficiaries’, or you can use this form.

4

Review your transactions

With a Defined Benefit account, your retirement benefit is calculated by multiplying a number that reflects both your years of service and your contribution rate (your multiple) with your final salary.

Your annual statement includes these details, as well as other information used to calculate your benefit, like your standard member contributions and contributions your employer has made on your behalf.

We have also included how your total resignation benefit has changed over the year, so you can see how your super is tracking.

If you have been adding more to your super by making voluntary contributions on top of the standard contributions, check that this is reflected on the Accumulation account section of your statement.

5

Check that you and your family are protected

Your super statement will detail the amounts payable to you if you resign, withdraw your money, or retire.

It will also show whether you are covered if you are off work due to sickness or injury, and the amount payable if you’re retrenched, die or become permanently disabled.

6

Check the performance of your investments

As a Defined Benefit account member, your entitlement is not impacted by market movements and you will get a defined benefit when you retire.

However, if you are interested in how the Defined benefit pool performed, we have included the compound average effective rate of net earnings over the last one, five and ten years.

If you also have an Accumulation account, your super statement will also show how your Accumulation account balance is invested and how those investment options performed.

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