Personal Finance's expose of unfair labour practices in the administration and rules of pension funds has sparked wide reader interest and caught the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) unawares.
The CCMA was established in 1995 in terms of the Labour Relations Act to deal with unfair labour practice complaints. Numerous readers who contacted the CCMA after the reports were published last week, were told by CCMA offices in some regions that the commission was not responsible for dealing with their problems.
But the CCMA head office has confirmed that the issue of unfair labour practices in relation to retirement fund benefits is their responsibility.
Problems with fair rules for retirement funds appear to be widespread as Personal Finance received numerous calls for assistance.
The main complaint concerned unfair withdrawal benefits for those who resign from a job.
Examples were cited of people receiving only the money they had paid into a retirement fund with little or no investment growth.
One person, who had belonged to a non-contributory scheme, was told on resigning that he had no withdrawal benefits because he had made no contributions.
Meetings are now being arranged between the Pension Lawyers Association and the CCMA to work out methods of handling the complaints.
In its expose Personal Finance reported that aggrieved retirement fund members, who have been prejudiced for years by unfair conduct or discriminatory rules on a wide range of issues including poor withdrawal benefits, now have more power to fight back.
We reported that pensions and labour lawyer Peter Strasheim said the decisions of some retirement fund trustees and employers could be ruled out of order in terms of the Labour Relations Act and Industrial Court decisions.
Strasheim said retirement fund trustees and employers may no longer make unilateral rule changes to your pension fund which affect substantive fund benefits.
He added that many existing rules and practices need to be re-evaluated to ensure they do not amount to unfair labour practices.
Courts have ruled that a retirement fund benefit is an element of your terms and conditions of employment because membership of a retirement fund is often compulsory for employees.
Strasheim said changes to benefits and substantive rule changes can now only be made after negotiations have taken place between employers and employees and trade unions.
The confusion in some regions about whether these matters are within the ambit of the authority of the CCMA or the Department of Labour have now been clarified.
A spokesman for the CCMA head office advised that retirement funding was classified as an employment benefit, as it was a condition of employment. In turn any dispute over retirement benefits could be referred for conciliation or arbitration to the CCMA.
You can act in your individual capacity if you do not belong to a union or do not belong to a work-place forum. If your company has work-place forums or you are a member of a union, you should work through that body.
The first step is to question your employer about the perceived unfair labour practice. If you or your representative body cannot resolve the situation, a dispute can be declared.
The impasse must then be referred to the CCMA or to accredited bargaining agencies. There are forms, supplied by the CCMA, that must be completed on declaring a dispute.
If the CCMA deals with the issue, it calls a meeting at which an attempt will be made to reach conciliation. If conciliation cannot be achieved within 30 days, the issue can go to arbitration or even directly to the Labour Court.
The parties, however, do not have to accept the rulings of the arbitrator, appointed by the CCMA, and can take the issue on appeal to the Labour Court if there are no precedents. The ruling of the Labour Court is final.
Note: Information about the CCMA is also available on the Internet.
CCMA forms can be downloaded from the site. The address is www.ccma.org.za