RBA ordered to resolve pension row

[Photo: Courtesy]

The High Court has given the Retirement Benefits Authority (RBA) 60 days to act on a complaint filed before it by members of the Postal Corporation pension scheme.

The retirees want their pension payments calculated in accordance with rules that were first laid out in the now-defunct Kenya Posts and Telecommunications Corporation (KPTC) scheme. They have accused RBA of dragging its feet in effecting the payments for three years now.

According to the Retirements Benefits Act, RBA must determine a ruling for a complaint before it within six months.

The pensioners claim when the Government split KPTC, they were absorbed in the PCK pension scheme.

The agreement was that the regulations that were formerly used to run the KPTC scheme should still be used to run the new scheme.

But according to the pensioners, PCK scheme members have refused to honour the agreement and have devised new regulations to run the scheme. The new regulations have created a new formula to calculate their pension, drastically reducing their dues.

In a judgment read by High Court Judge George Odunga on Monday, RBA has been faulted for ‘sitting’ on the complaint for too long, a fact that has led to the aggrieved pensioners missing out on millions in pension payments from KPTC trustees.

"It has been averred that the pensioners have been dissatisfied with their pension benefits since they are entitled to their pension under the terms and conditions of their original employment with KPTC scheme,” said Justice Odunga.