Bank pensioners decry poor management of retirement funds

Barclays Bank of Kenya Pensioners’ Association has raised concern over how their pensions are being managed.

The former employees of Barclays, now Absa Bank, said the poor performance of the fund has been made worse by inflationary pressures. Colleta Malinda, the association’s chairperson said they have lost half of the value of their purchasing power due to inflation, making it difficult to cope with the high cost of living. They said the lender told them that the market has not been generating higher returns during the good years, and worse still, has signaled even lower returns this year blaming it on the economic slowdown.

“As pensioners we hold that the poor performance of the fund is attributed to lack of monitoring by the trustees to engage with their investment fund managers,’’ said Malinda in a press statement.

Malinda claimed the bank has also disregarded their input and have lost representation at the Board of Trustees.

Balance sheet

This is after two of pensioners members were not replaced when they retired but the Bank introduced more employees of the Bank as Trustees contrary to the Retirements Benefits Act. “After devoting years serving the bank, diligently setting aside their earnings for old age, we find it callous that the Absa Bank, a pan African lender with presence in 12 countries and a half a trillion-balance sheet, find it costly to take care of our interests after we have retired,’’ claimed Malinda.

She explained that Regular payment of Annual increase in pension (COLA) stopped after Absa took over as the sponsor of the Pension Fund contrary to RBA Rules and regulations.        –

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