Also they can trigger the transfer from their side.
Veranlasst die versicherte Person die Übertragung nicht selber, muss die neue Vorsorgeeinrichtung die Übertragung verlangen.
I think unless you’re sure you won’t be impacted best to review the volatility tolerance of your VBs (ie how much you’d be impacted by a forced transfer in a downturn).
At least the french version is fairly clear, legislation would change from:
Art 11 al. 2 LFLP
L’institution peut réclamer la prestation de sortie provenant du rapport de prévoyance antérieur ainsi que le capital de prévoyance provenant d’une autre forme de prévoyance et les créditer à l’assuré.
to
L’institution de prévoyance doit réclamer la prestation de sortie à l’ancienne institution de prévoyance ou à l’institution de libre passage. Elle n’a pas besoin d’obtenir le consentement de l’assuré.
So no consent needed (and stronger wording that it’s not really a choice for the pension provider, it switch from “can request” to “must request”)
edit: the only choice is about being about to delay it by up to two years (but even then if you end up needing the insurance part for old age/invalidity, afaict they can trigger it)
That‘s a big one.
If I would be in that situation, I‘d only do a conservative portfolio like 50/50 stocks/bonds in my VB account, to hedge against that risk.
Still miles better than most pension funds.
So is this already a law? Or is it just a proposal?
I see in the article Jan 2025 as time for consultation
At a minimum it would trigger on the next job change (“forgotten” VBs would be communicated).
Indeed it seems unlikely your current pension would look into existing VBs (but I don’t think there’s anything forbidding it, e.g. if you have a triggering event like disability/old age).
Are you sure? It just says funds must actively search for those assets, maybe some even know of VB accounts of their insurees. So they would be obliged to demand those assets, no?
If they are serious about enforcing this, then they’ll need to bring in effective sanctions.
The motions mentions both 1e and VB for this 2 year period.
Instead of closing a loophole, you could interpret it as in widening it, or rather watering the rules down…
In my understanding
So let’s wait and see what happens on this one 
Yeah the difference is that now they have to actively request the data and request the funds.
I’m not so sure, I mean aren’t they risking their FINMA license if they don’t comply to regulations? Shouldn’t it be sufficient incentives?
I was thinking more on the holder of the funds. Maybe they could even allow it and add a 1% tax/levy per annum. That way people could chose and maybe think it is worth paying 1%.
The new legislation would remove the beneficiary from the loop, it’s all on the VB and pension institutions.
I think once the law is passed, no VB provider in their right mind will let people have VB accounts when they are employed
And if employer pension fund can search for info based on AHV number, it would be rather straightforward exercise
There is nothing to lobby because this was the expectation since the beginning.
But for me the 2 year period is a good improvement to help people recover losses in case they got hit bear markets at time of job change
For someone if VB capital growth is more important and relevant than their actual job / employment income then most likely they are already at stage of FIRE and should not seek employment.
Remember transfer of VB is only for employed people. Unemployed or Retired or FIRED people don’t need to transfer anything.
How many people are we talking about? (who forgot to transfer their VB on purpose) My guess is that it’s a rather small number.
It would have to be a fair chunk. Let’s say you earn 120k a year after tax (170k pre-tax) and assume that you can get 4% more in VB than in pension fund.
Then you would need around 3 million in the VB for the growth to be more than your salary.
That said, the returns from the S&P500 were so huge the past couple of decades, it probably would have been worth it in a lot of scenarios!
Yes one should. And one could. But the opportunity cost would always come into play.
But you said some people might leave CH for this or become self employed just because pension fund returns are lower than VB returns. Those people need to be really rich and I would say they cannot be that many.
I simply do not believe that there is a vast population who fall in that bracket.
You don’t need to be that rich to reach a point where retiring becomes more attractive than working due to the forced investment into bad pension plans.
If somebody contributed >10% per year (employee + employer) with an annual income of 150-200k, near retirement they could easily reach 1.5mn CHF in their pension plan. If they expect a ~7% return on VB or ~1% return by working in a company, then that’s 90k a year of loss from working. Given that these 90k are essentially tax-free, it represents at least 120k of lost pre-tax income.
At this point, that person would have to decide “Would I rather work 40h a week to earn e.g., 150-200k pre-tax a year, or just stop working and earn the equivalent of ~120k pre-tax just from the additional returns”.
It’s pretty strange to me that the Swiss government has effectively created a system that disincentives people near retirement so much from keeping a full-time job.
This post here:
Solves this discussion for good. Just don‘t do it, the loophole is beeing closed.
I think Swiss government is trying to change all this to eventually being more returns to 2nd pillar so that VB differential is reduced
That’s why 1E is being more efficient by allowing 2 years additional period of buffer in case of market crash issues.
I wouldn’t be surprised if few years down the line 1E becomes a standard offering and BVG will only control the mandatory pension.
—-/
Coming to assumptions
Having said that, you are right. If these assumption do hold true, someone can choose to retire if they have enough income outside pension funds to support themselves
A good point on whether the incremental amount is worth it for the 40 hours of work.
Another thing I thought about was whether it is really fair to compare the 1% to the 7% as there are 2 different asset classes with different risks. Maybe it is more fair to compare the 1% to the return on Swiss government bonds, in which case you’re looking at <1%.