Canada Pension Plan
A contributory, earnings-related social insurance program that is paid by the federal government. It provides a measure of income to contributors and their families upon retirement, disability, and death. For further details, contact Service Canada.
WTW case management system within eePoint.
WTW secure website used to send/receive reports and other confidential member-related data. For more information, refer to Pension Administration System (eepoint) and Data Exchange Tools.
WTW Pension Administration System. For more information, refer to Pension Administration System (eepoint) and Data Exchange Tools.
Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario
An independent regulatory agency whose role is to ensure pension plans meet the legal standard in the Pension Benefits Act (PBA). Their objective is to improve consumer and pension plan beneficiary protections in Ontario.
Income Tax Act
A federally legislated act with underlying regulations that outline, among other things, the maximum limits for registered pension plans. The Income Tax Act allows employees and employers to deduct pension contributions from their respective income for tax purposes and sets standards for the benefits a pension plan can provide. It is regulated by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA)
Data files that contain employee/member data required to administer pension benefits that are sent bi-weekly from each participating employer to WTW via:
- I1 Data File – transmits Demographic & HR/Employment data on a bi-weekly I1 schedule
- I2 Data File – transmits Contribution & Payroll data on a bi-weekly I2 schedule
Refer to Reporting Data through the I1 & I2 Data Interfaces for more information
Jointly Sponsored Pension Plan
A pension plan in which decision making and funding of the benefits is shared jointly by both employees and the sponsor/employer. It’s a pension plan where there is a partnership in the governance of the plan. The Plan is a JSPP
Self-service website for active, deferred and retired members to access pension-related information and transactions.
Ontario Compensation Employees Union, CUPE Local 1750
- Co-Sponsor of the Plan (with WSIB)
Pension Adjustment
The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) deemed value of the lifetime pension benefit earned by a member during a calendar year which affects the member’s RRSP contribution room for the following year. Refer to Annual Pension Adjustment Report (I7) for more information.
Participating Employers of the Plan include:
The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB), Infrastructure Health and Safety Association (IHSA), Public Services Health and Safety Association (PSHSA), Workplace Safety and Prevention Services (WSPS), Workplace Safety North (WSN), and the Trustees of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board Pension Plan Fund (WISE Trust).
Pension Benefits Act (Ontario)
Provincial pension legislation enforced by FSRA, which regulates pension plans in Ontario and determines minimum standards for eligibility, funding, and benefits for Ontario-registered pension plans.
The base salary received by an employee for their employment position while a member of the Plan.
Refer to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) for specific Pensionable Earnings inclusion and exclusions.
Note: Contributions must be deducted from Pensionable Earnings in accordance with the Contribution Rate Schedule.
Represents the total years, months and days of service during which the employee, or the employer on behalf of the employee, contributes to the Plan or Supplementary Plan and can include service during which an employee is receiving short-term, or long-term disability benefits, or while in receipt of benefits from a claim filed under the WSIA (WSIB claim benefit).
Note: Pensionable Service is derived from member employment statuses provided by Participating Employers via the I1 Data File and required contributions amounts deducted and provided via the I2 Data File.
Pensionable service can also be purchased by members for periods of temporary employment and certain leaves of absences, or transferred in by members from another pension plan.
Secure File Transfer Protocol
- Transmission method by which I1 and I2 Data Files are sent from Participating Employers to WTW.
Safe Workplace Associations
Infrastructure Health & Safety Association (IHSA)
Public Services Health & Safety Association (PSHSA)
Workplace Safety & Prevention Services (WSPS)
Workplace Safety North (WSN)
WSIB Employees’ Supplementary Pension Plan (ESPP)
- A “top-up” retirement compensation arrangement that provides employees of the WSIB and SWA a pension benefit in excess of the maximum pension benefit permitted under the Plan and the ITA; the Plan and the Supplementary Plan (the “plans”) operate together to provide the same retirement benefit that the employee would have received if the ITA limits did not exist.
- Sponsored and administered solely by WSIB.
- Refer to Supplementary Plan for more information.
WSIB Employees’ Pension Plan (often referred to as the “WISE Trust Plan” or the “EPP”)
- A contributory defined-benefit pension plan registered and regulated under the Ontario Pension Benefits Act (“PBA”) and the federal Income Tax Act (“ITA”).
- Jointly sponsored by the WSIB and OCEU and administered by WISE Trust.
- Refer to the Plan for more information.
Workplace Safety & Insurance Board
- Co-Sponsor (with OCEU) and Participating Employer of the Plan.
- Sponsor and administrator of the Supplementary Plan.
Workplace Insurance and Safety Employee Trust
- The Trustees of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board Employees’ Pension Plan (Board of Trustees).
- Legal Administrator of the Plan.
Pension contact centre for employees and members of the Plan and Supplementary Plan:
By Phone:
Call toll free: 1-855-242-1526
Outside of North America: 678-932-4144
Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. EST
By mail:
130 King Street West
Suite 1500, P.O. Box 424
Toronto, ON M5X 1E3
Online via My Pension Resource:
Willis Towers Watson
- Pension Administration Service Provider for the Plan and the Supplementary Plan.
- Refer to Pension Administration Service Provider for the Pension Plans for more information.
Enrolling a Member
This page provides background information on the enrollment process and describes the procedures you will need to follow to enroll a member in the Plan.
Membership in the Plan is mandatory or optional, depending on the employee’s employment type:
- For permanent employees, enrolment in the Plan upon date of hire is mandatory
- For temporary employees, membership in the Plan is optional after the completion of 24 months of continuous employment
Note: Employees hired under a contract for services are not eligible to join the Plan
Special enrollment rules may apply:
- When re-employing a former member or a retired member, refer to Re-employed Member
- When hiring an employee who has a prior period of employment with another Participating Employer immediately preceding the date of hire (i.e., no break in employment service), refer to Enrolling a Member with Prior a Period of Employment with another Participating Employer
Getting Started
To complete an enrollment, you must ensure the following mandatory information for each employee is entered into your HR/Payroll system(s). This information will transmit on the I1 Demographic & HR Data Interface file (refer to Reporting Data through the I1 & I2 Data Interfaces for process details).
- Member Information
- SIN
- Name
- Date of birth
- Gender
- Pension ID (SWA employees only; use block of IDs provided)
- Address Information
- Mailing address
- Work email address
- Home and work phone (per SWA defaults setup)
- Employment Information
- Date of hire
- Plan membership date
- Employment type/Work Category
- Union designation
- Base salary
- Full-time Equivalent % (FTE) and effective date
- Business Unit (per SWA defaults setup)
Keep in mind that if your platform is ADP-WFN, your new hire or rehire will transmit on the I1 Data Interface file only after the pay is processed.
Permanent Employees
Membership in the Plan for permanent employees is mandatory (subject to minimum hours or earnings requirements for permanent part-time employees) – permanent employees must join on their date of hire. Contributions are mandatory from the date of hire, the day plan membership starts.
- Create a profile for the employee in your HR/Payroll system(s).
- For SWA employers, upon hire you must issue a Pension ID from the block of IDs provided to you by WSIB and enter the plan membership date (date of hire) into the appropriate data field.
- Pension contributions to the Plan must begin on the date of hire.
- Once the I1 Demographic & HR Data Interface file is sent via SFTP to WTW and processed on eePoint, the WTW Admin Team will send you, the employer, the Eligibility Validation Report (E01) via DataLink advising if any eligible employees have been missed, or if any employees have been incorrectly identified as eligible.
- If you have enrolled an employee incorrectly, you will need to update your system, and work with the WTW Admin Team and/or WISE Trust as required to resolve the issue; add your resolution comments to the E01 Report and return the report to the WTW Admin Team via DataLink
- If you need to enroll an employee retroactively dating back to a prior year, contact WISE Trust for assistance with the process to calculate any prior year retroactive pension contributions owed to the Plan and/or Supplementary Plan.
- Pension contributions are based on the contribution rates in effect for each year of membership in the Plan.
After an employee is enrolled in the Plan, WTW will mail a “Welcome Package” to the new member. The “Welcome Package” includes:
- Guidebook and Contact Information
- Spousal Declaration & Beneficiary Designation Form
- Information on purchasing service (including periods of Temporary employment) and transferring service into the Plan
Temporary Employees
Membership in the Plan for temporary employees (either employed on a full-time or part-time temporary basis) is optional – they may elect to join the Plan after 24 months of continuous employment. Contributions are mandatory from the day plan membership starts.
- For SWA Employers, similar to permanent employees, upon hire you must issue a Pension ID for temporary employees from the block of IDs provided by WSIB
- The plan membership date field should remain blank until the temporary employee elects to join the Plan
- The WTW Admin Team will monitor a temporary employee’s eligibility to join the Plan
- Six (6) months prior to the date of eligibility (24 months of continuous employment), the WTW Admin Team will send an “Enrolment Option Form” to the temporary employee
- If the temporary employee elects to join the Plan, they will appear on the New Eligibility Report (E02) which is sent to you, the employer, via DataLink on a biweekly basis
- You will need to update your HR/Payroll system(s) to reflect the enrollment/plan entry date provided on E02 Report, the “Plan Elect Date”
- Note: the effective date of enrolment/plan entry on the E02 Report is the later of the eligibility date or the next closest payroll date if the option form was received from the employee after the eligibility date
- Contributions must start as of the “Plan Elect Date” as provided on the E02 Report; if there are any issues, document the resolution on the E02 Report and return to the WTW Admin Team via DataLink
- Once the date is updated on your system, it is important to track and confirm the plan entry/membership date on eePoint in the next interface run for temporary employees who have joined the Plan. This will ensure that the appropriate employee contribution deductions have been fed across as well as the plan entry date information. Please review eePoint and flag any questions/concerns via ‘Case’
- Temporary Employees who elect to join the Plan cannot cancel their membership after their plan membership date
- For the WTW Admin Team to send out the “Enrolment Option Form” to an eligible temporary employee by the legislative deadline, it’s important that you, as a participating employer, provide accurate and timely employee data from the date of hire.
- For the WTW Admin Team to send out a “Welcome Package” by the legislative deadline to a temporary employee who has elected to join the plan, you must update the plan membership date in your HR/Payroll system as indicated in the New Eligibility Report (E02) to complete the enrollment.
After a temporary employee is enrolled in the Plan, WTW will mail a “Welcome Package” to the new member. The “Welcome Package” includes:
- Guidebook and Contact Information
- Spousal Declaration & Beneficiary Designation Form
- Information on purchasing service (including periods of temporary employment prior to joining the Plan) and transferring service into the Plan
Re-employed Member
- Re-employed Before Retirement
- Former members who terminated and either received a full settlement of benefits or are entitled to a deferred pension (“deferred member”)
- Re-employed After Retirement
- Retired members in receipt of a pension who are re-employed on a temporary basis
- Retired members in receipt of a pension who re-employed on a permanent basis
Re-employed Before Retirement
A re-employed member will be identified via SIN by WTW through the I1 and I2 data interface process where eePoint will create a separate record for each period of membership as each period is treated separately for pension purposes:
- Each record is identified/connected to ensure any future changes (e.g., address changes) are applied to each period’s record, as required.
- A deferred member who is re-employed is treated as a new employee
Follow the same enrolment process for Permanent Employees or Temporary Employees as appropriate.
Note: if a former member is subsequently employed by another participating employer, refer to Enrolling a Member with a Prior Period of Employment with another Participating Employer for special processing.
Re-employment After Retirement
When a retired member, who is receiving a pension from the Plan, is subsequently re-employed, enrollment in the Plan may be mandatory or optional depending on their employment type.
Permanently Re-employed After Retirement
If a retired member is re-employed as a Permanent Employee, the member’s pension must be suspended for the period of re-employment.
- You must:
- Notify WISE Trust
- Provide the date of hire, first/last name and Pension ID
- WISE Trust will advise the WTW Admin Team and our Pension Payment Service Provider to suspend pension payments
- Note: If a retired member receives a pension payment(s) while a Permanent Employee in error, he or she must repay the amount to the Plan, plus interest
- The WTW Admin Team, with support from WISE Trust, will work with the retired member to recover the overpayment
Note: Suspended pensions will be indexed every year on January 1
- Enroll the member as per Permanent Employees
- Notify WISE Trust
Temporarily Re-employed After Retirement
If a retired member is re-employed as a Temporary Employee, the member will continue to receive his or her pension until he or she elects to rejoin the Plan after 24 months of continuous service.
- If you require a calculation to determine the maximum pensionable earnings upon hire for a Temporary Employee in accordance with your HR Policy, please request the calculation form WTW by creating a ‘Case‘ in eePoint
- Enroll the member as per Temporary Employees
Enrolling a Member with a Prior Period of Employment with another Participating Employer
A employee does not cease to be a member of the Plan if the employee terminated employment with one Participating Employer and immediately commences employment with another Participation Employer:
- the date of hire with the new Participating Employer must be the next business day following the termination of employment with the prior Participating Employer
If there is no break in employment between the Participating Employers, service under the Plan continues:
- Contributions with the new Participating Employer must be based on year-to-date (YTD) Pensionable Earnings that include earnings from the prior Participating Employer
- The new Participating Employer will need to add/combine the YTD Pensionable Earning from the prior Participating Employer for the year the member transfers employment to ensure the correct contribution rate above and below the YMPE is used
- Contact WISE Trust for assistance in obtaining the YTD Pensionable Earnings from the prior Participating Employer
As the new Participating Employer, if you are not aware of the member’s prior immediate employment, this will be flagged on the data validation reports, the I1 New Hire Report and the I2 Contribution Discrepancy Report. As noted above, contact WISE Trust for assistance.
Enrollment Process Training Available
For training on the eligibility process and reports, go to Training Resources.