Dear Union Representatives,

Earlier this year the IAM National Pension Fund Board of Trustees implemented a new pension benefit disbursement policy to be effective on January 1, 2019. 

This policy states that beginning in January 2019, all Pension Benefit Recipients must receive their benefit payments through Mandatory Direct Deposit. This change was put in place for security and administrative reasons.

The Benefit Funds Office notified the impacted population, those Benefit Recipients still receiving a paper check, with a series of four notifications in June, September, November, and December 2018. The notifications, which described the policy change and included a Direct Deposit Form for completion and return, were included with their benefit checks in each of the noted months. Benefit Recipients were also advised in  the December 11, 2018 letter that if they did not submit the required documentation to be enrolled in Direct Deposit by December 27, 2018, their check would be put on Administrative Hold until a Direct Deposit Form was received. Using rules similar to the Social Security Administration, the policy includes a limited number of exceptions, which also required the submission of documents to the Benefit Fund Office for waiver approval.

The implementation of this policy was very successful, reducing the number of Benefit Recipients receiving paper checks from over 8,000 to under 1,700 by the end of the year.

This email is to notify you that approximately 1,700 Benefit Recipients will be placed on Administrative Hold and will not receive their January 2019 pension benefit check in the mail, as they did not return the required Direct Deposit documents or apply for one of the approved policy waivers. 

If any of your retirees or beneficiaries contact you regarding this matter, we ask that you please refer them to our Customer Service Call Center at 1-800-424-9608, ext. 222, so they can begin the enrollment process and have their January 2019 pension check released. Once they call and start the process, their check will be mailed. Our Customer Service Call Center is available from 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.