The National Pension Commission (PenCom) said a total of 245,625 retirement savings account (RSA) holders have changed their pension fund administrators (PFAs) between 2020 and 2023.
This was contained in the commission’s November report released on its website. The commission said in 2023 alone, no fewer than 101,820 RSA holders moved from one PFA to another. The figure represented an increase of 10.2 per cent when compared to 92,413 transfers recorded in 2022. It is the highest recorded so far in the sector.
According to the report, a total of N462 billion was moved by the RSA holders in the review year, which was 28 per cent higher than the N361.5 billion that was transferred in the previous year.
This transfer is in line with section 13 of the Pension Reform Act (PRA) 2014, which specifies that an RSA holder may transfer his/her account from one PFA to another.
The RSA Transfer System (RTS) is an application that is used for coordinating all the processes relating to the transfer of RSAs from one PFA to another.
The RTS is designed to provide an electronic platform through which RSA transfers are initiated, processed and monitored the global net transfer positions (GNTPs) of all affected PFAs determined on a real-time basis.
According to the RSA Transfer Guideline, transfer requests are processed based on their effective transfer dates (ETDs), which is the last day of the last month of each transfer quarter –31st March, 30th June, 30th September and 31st December.
It was also complimented by the recapitalisation of the PFAs from N1 billion to N5 billion, which resulted in a series of mergers and acquisitions in the industry.
