Did your employer have min retirement age?

[DAYDREAMER]

Our min age to get DB was age 55 and 10 years of service. 2% penalty per year for each year before age 60, so 10% penalty if retiring at 55. Also, company paid health care at 55 if you started working for company earlier than 2007.

Company had a union negotiated rule stating that if you were layed off, all retirement rules stay in tact for 6 years, so, if you were 49 when layed off, you could still retain all early retirement benefits at age 55. Our company offered a Voluntary Layoff (VLO) which I took at 52. Was FI, and just waiting for any reason to get out. Thank you Mega Corp!

DW organization (same company) was offered the VLO the following year. She jumped too. She started her pension (+healthcare for us) last February, and I will start pension next May (at age 55).

Do to jumping ship before 55, we did forgo the ability to tap our 401k until 59 1/2. No biggie, pensions + after tax savings/investments will easily bridge the gap.

 

[Finance Dave]

MegaCorp had minimum of 55 years, but benefits were reduced. "Normal" retirement age was 65. This assumes you took the annuity option. It was a defined contribution plan that you could either take cash balance (upon leaving company you could move to IRA or leave it sit with the company...which is what I've done) or annuitize it and take distributions starting as early as 55. There was no service requirement other than the 5 year vesting.

 

[Bir48die]

My company was like the Supreme Court. Till death do us part. I departed

 

[FI_RElater]

Oh Gosh. Everybody thinks CSRS is so great ( and it is actually), but FERS is pretty good too compared to almost everything else. All my Family is CSRS and they laud it over me all the time but what gets overlooked is that CSRS requires a significant employee contribution and no Soc Sec benefit in most cases.

When I started looking into my DB plan at Megacorp (as it was being frozen, grandfathered and eliminated for new hires) I realized it was a FREE benefit. I like Free! It also had an optional contribution with a phenomenal payout. Our plan was 85 points or age 55 w/ 10yrs. The age 55 benefit was severely reduced.

The old CSRS was far superior... 2X multiplier on YOS, vs 1X under FERS (1.1 for those after 62).... and they could retire as early as 56 with full benefits. The original FERS only required a smaller cost, but did require SS, so basically had the same employee costs as the old CSRS but with reduced benefits. (even the "supplement" to age 62 gave less than full "age 62 SS benefits", although it could be up to about 70% of them, at best). Remember that for a significant amount of your income, from SS, you need to wait until FRA or later to optimize ; so true "early retirees" needed to pile up a very large nest egg to make it. (while there is matching on their 401k equivalent, it's not significantly better than private sector.... for those in technical or STEM positions)

The current version requires a much higher contribution level (4 something percent) along with SS.... with potential to raise even higher. {It's easily argued that 4plus percent, invested by the employee at say 60/40 could approach or beat any benefits under the new system.... and the money would be yours! and could be inherited by your heirs, or could be used in some later date to purchase a SPIA that would give income higher than the pension, although with fewer protections and possibly missing tax breaks depending on the state}

 

[Kabowest]

A minimum age of 58 with 10 years of service gave me 50% medical until eligible for Medicare. No other benefits beyond that. Not complaining, happy to have reasonable costed medical ins.

 

[chilkoot]

Where I worked, retiree healthcare had a minimum. I had to be 55...Pension was a vested benefit, so there was no age stipulation.

This was my situation. Age 55 was the threshold I was waiting to cross.

 

[Vacation4us]

DH pension is 3% per year at 50yo can’t work a day past 60yo. New guys have to wait till 55 or 57 depending on what year they started and there is now a cap on the max dollar amount. No lump sum option.

My tiny pension was 1.4% at 65 vested after 5 years you can take 50% reduction at 55yo. I will wait till 65 to collect $1.2 k a month

 

[Vacation4us]

Oh Gosh. Everybody thinks CSRS is so great ( and it is actually), but FERS is pretty good too compared to almost everything else. All my Family is CSRS and they laud it over me all the time but what gets overlooked is that CSRS requires a significant employee contribution and no Soc Sec benefit in most cases.

When I started looking into my DB plan at Megacorp (as it was being frozen, grandfathered and eliminated for new hires) I realized it was a FREE benefit. I like Free! It also had an optional contribution with a phenomenal payout. Our plan was 85 points or age 55 w/ 10yrs. The age 55 benefit was severely reduced.

Definitely not free. DH has contributed 420k over his working career to fund his pension. And yes that amount was solely contributed by him. That’s an average of 14k a year. This year alone his contribution is over 20k. Stay past the max % you still contribute.

 

[NoiseBoy]

To retire and start your pension, which is the only way to start the retiree medical, you must have 30 years of service, or be at least 55 with 15 years of service. The early start penalty is 4% per year from age 62 (full retirement age IF you hit one of the two targets.)

But, our pensions are being frozen on 12/31/19.

 

[jollystomper]

Back when my Megacorp provided pensions, I believe you were vested after 5 years and could retire and start receiving a reduced pension after 30 years with no age limit, or at 55 with at least 15 years of service.

The pension maxed out at age 65. If I had retired after 30 years (age 51) I would have received about 58% of the age 65 amount. When I did retire at 60 I received 98% of the age 65 amount. For me it wasn't worth working another 5 years for that additional 2%.

I believe the earliest age you could receive the vested pension if you left after being vested and before retirement was 55. A sister worked for around 8 years at the same Megacorp, she turned 55 this year and we discussed her options of taking it now or waiting until age 65.

 

[badatmath]

But, our pensions are being frozen on 12/31/19.

Ugh. Sorry. Did they just do an across the board freeze for all employees of all ages? My megacorp often has some grandfathering into their changes though I never seem to be on the right end of that!


Wish I had 30 years with no age limit I'd be out very soon!

 

[unclemick]

Layed off age 50 after 23 years of service. No healthcare. Took early pension at 55. After 12 years bought some Blue-Cross/Blue-shield in Kansas City at age 62.

heh heh heh -

 

[RobbieB]

No minimum age for anything except you had to be 18 to get hired.

No pension, no retired medical, just the 401K. Microcorp.

 

[BeachOrCity]

Back when my Megacorp provided pensions, I believe you were vested after 5 years and could retire and start receiving a reduced pension after 30 years with no age limit, or at 55 with at least 15 years of service.

The pension maxed out at age 65. If I had retired after 30 years (age 51) I would have received about 58% of the age 65 amount. When I did retire at 60 I received 98% of the age 65 amount. For me it wasn't worth working another 5 years for that additional 2%.

I believe the earliest age you could receive the vested pension if you left after being vested and before retirement was 55. A sister worked for around 8 years at the same Megacorp, she turned 55 this year and we discussed her options of taking it now or waiting until age 65.

Huh? I think we had the same megacorp. The pension was completely frozen at ye 2007.
Iirc no one got service credit or earnings credit after that.
So if one was pension eligible starting in a year after 2007 the benefit amount should have been the same whether they retired in 2008 or 2018
The only factor would be that they needed to be eligible in both years (ie 30 years any age or 55 age w 15 years)


What am I missing?

 

[NW-Bound]

Oh Gosh. Everybody thinks CSRS is so great ( and it is actually), but FERS is pretty good too compared to almost everything else. All my Family is CSRS and they laud it over me all the time but what gets overlooked is that CSRS requires a significant employee contribution and no Soc Sec benefit in most cases...

A while back, out of curiosity I looked into CSRS and FERS, although I was never a federal worker. I do not remember the details, only that they are better than SS, in terms of benefit/contribution ratio.

 

[Luvdogs]

Ours was rule of 70-lower amount or rule of 80-higher amount. So a combination of years of service plus age would work.

I retired at 52 with 20 years so rule of 70. Pension with non- COLA increase and retiree health insurance (YAY!!- I keep sweating that it will continue until I'm 65).

Fewer and fewer places have this. Ours was frozen a couple of years later.

 

[MarieIG]

My employers have had a don't-let-the-door-hit-you-on-the-way-out policy. No benefits whatsoever.

 

[retire202052]

Rule of 80....(age + yrs of service)....plan to get out at 52.

 

[badatmath]

I would love for rule of 80 I would be gone today.

 

[eytonxav]

My former mega corp hit you with a reduction if you left before age 55. I left at 54 under a very good voluntary retirement offer that more than made up for the reduction. I think we had rule of 76 in effect at that time, but I actually had 80 points with age and years of service.

 

[Finance Dave]

I would love for rule of 80 I would be gone today.

But you are bad at math...so are you sure you haven't already met that rule?

 

[Amethyst]

Yes, I paid 7% of my salary into the plan my whole career, instead of 6.5% to SS. I do not qualify for SS. Same for my husband. Granted, our pensions are higher than the SS we might have received for the same salary.

Another thing is that while a number of states do not tax SS benefits, most tax CSRS pensions as regular income. MD+county tax took 8.5% off the top.

I've never even mentioned my retirement plan to family members, let alone lauded it over them. It would seem...un-familial.

Oh Gosh. Everybody thinks CSRS is so great ( and it is actually), but FERS is pretty good too compared to almost everything else. All my Family is CSRS and they laud it over me all the time but what gets overlooked is that CSRS requires a significant employee contribution and no Soc Sec benefit in most cases.

When I started looking into my DB plan at Megacorp (as it was being frozen, grandfathered and eliminated for new hires) I realized it was a FREE benefit. I like Free! It also had an optional contribution with a phenomenal payout. Our plan was 85 points or age 55 w/ 10yrs. The age 55 benefit was severely reduced.

 

[badatmath]

But you are bad at math...so are you sure you haven't already met that rule?

LOL

 

[GalaxyBoy]

What’s a pension? Retiree healthcare? We had a 401(k) and that’s all for retirement.

 

[jollystomper]

Huh? I think we had the same megacorp. The pension was completely frozen at ye 2007.
Iirc no one got service credit or earnings credit after that.
So if one was pension eligible starting in a year after 2007 the benefit amount should have been the same whether they retired in 2008 or 2018
The only factor would be that they needed to be eligible in both years (ie 30 years any age or 55 age w 15 years)


What am I missing?

I don't know if we were at the same Meagcorp. At my megacorp the pension was frozen in terms of earnings credit, but the service credit still grew. The longer I worked, the higher my pension grew (though the growth was not nearly what it would have been before the service credit freeze). The difference between me retiring in 2009 vs. 2018 was over $20K/year.