A supplementary pension is a pension you can build up on top of your statutory pension during your career as an employee or self-employed person. A supplementary pension is often referred to as the second pension pillar.

There are four pension pillars in Belgium:

• First pillar:
  This is your statutory pension as a salaried employee, self-employed person or civil servant. For more information, visit the "statutory pension" section of www.mypension.be.
• Second pillar:
  This is the supplementary pension you can build up during your career as an employee or self-employed person.
• Third pillar:
  This is the personal supplementary pension that you can build up privately through pension savings and/or an individual life insurance and that entitles you to tax relief.
• Fourth pillar:
  This is your personal savings plan that does not offer you any extra tax relief (a property investment and a savings account, for example).

Visit mygroupinsurance.vivium.be for more information about the supplementary pension (second pillar) you are building up or have built up with Vivium as a salaried employee.

Your expected supplementary pension (as a salaried employee in the second pillar) is shown on your benefit statement or on mygroupinsurance.vivium.be in the section "How much supplementary pension can I expect if I save until I reach the contract's retirement age?". If you have more than one contract, the amounts are added up.

The amount you see is an estimate of your supplementary pension when you retire.

The actual amount at retirement will depend on the further course of your career and is also affected by various other factors, such as the length of your career, any promotions, part-time work and so on.

You may also have other supplementary pension contracts from when you were working for previous employers, for example. The government website "mypension.be" offers you a complete overview.

The "accrued reserves" are the amount that is already saved on the calculation date.

The "acquired benefit" is the further accrual of these accrued reserves until your contract's maturity without further financing.

The "projected benefit" is the gross amount you can expect to receive at maturity if all future premiums are paid as before and continue to be accrued under the same conditions. This is often not the case. You therefore need to bear in mind that certain factors will affect your expected benefit. For example, you may change jobs, you may start working part-time, your premium may be indexed, or your premium may change because of a salary adjustment or promotion.

It is therefore interesting to log on to mygroupinsurance.vivium.be every time your benefit statement is updated. This will show you the evolution of the accrued reserves and the projected benefit in your contract(s).

The insurer may decide to allocate a profit share depending on the insurance company's results. A profit share is therefore additional return on top of the interest rate already applied to the paid-in premiums. The total return on your savings reserves is determined by an interest rate that is granted based on the deposits and any profit share.

As standard, the payment of the retirement benefits is linked to the actual start of the (early) statutory pension. The payout is mandatory at that time (withdrawal obligation).

However, you can receive your group insurance amount before you retire in the event of the following exceptions:

• a payout is possible for affiliates who have reached their statutory retirement age or who meet the conditions to take their statutory pension early, but who have not yet took up their statutory pension (withdrawal entitlement).
• you can make an early (partial) withdrawal of your savings reserves in order to buy or renovate a property located in the European Economic Area. You can find more information about this in the "Other events" section.

When paying out the pension lump sum, Vivium deducts the advance tax payment and the parafiscal levies.

The pension capital accrued through employer contributions is subject to a 3.55% contribution to the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance, a 0%, 1% or 2% solidarity contribution depending on the benefit's size and a 16.66% advance tax payment. This is also the case for the pension capital accrued through your own personal contributions before 1993. The advance tax payment on the pension capital you accrued through your personal contributions after 1993 is 10.09%.

You pay the following:

For pension capital accrued through employer contributions or personal contributions before 1993:

• a 3.55% contribution to the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance;
• a 0%, 1% or 2% solidarity contribution depending on the benefit's size;
• a 16.66% advance tax payment.

For pension capital accrued through personal contributions after 1993:

• a 3.55% contribution to the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance;
• a 0%, 1% or 2% solidarity contribution depending on the benefit's size;
• a 10.09% advance tax payment.

You may be eligible for a lower advance tax payment of 10.09% on the pension capital accrued through employer contributions if you "continue to effectively work without interruption" until you reach statutory retirement age. This applies to the last three years at least.

Since 1 January 2019, this tax reduction also applies to employees who have not yet reached statutory retirement age, but whose career spans more than 45 years and who have "continued to effectively work without interruption" until they met the conditions for a complete career.

Who has "continued to effectively work without interruption"?

These are employees:

• who have continued to work until they reach the statutory retirement age; or
• whose careers span more than 45 years and who are retiring before they reach the statutory retirement age.

The following periods of inactivity do not compromise the status of having "continued to effectively work without interruption":

• periods during which you received statutory sick pay or disability benefit;
• periods of involuntary unemployment during which you remained available to enter the labour market;
• periods during which you remained "theoretically available" to enter the labour market in an unemployment scheme with a company supplement (bridging pension) after 1 January 2015.

After Vivium receives a notification of your retirement from the Federal Pensions Service, Vivium will send you a settlement statement by post. You need to complete the requested information on the forms, add the requested certificates and supporting documents and return the original documents to Vivium. Vivium will check that the documents are complete and correct and will then transfer the net pension lump sum into your bank account.

Yes. Vivium deducts an advance tax payment when it pays out your pension lump sum. This tax takes into account a partial settlement of the municipal surcharges. This means that an advance payment of municipal tax is already withheld when your net pension lump sum is paid out.

You must declare the amounts subject to advance tax payment and the advance tax payment itself in the year following the payment with the relevant codes on your official tax document (281.11). The final settlement of the municipal tax therefore does not happen until the year after you have received your net pension lump sum.

Vivium will send you the official tax document (281.11) by post in April of the year after your net pension lump sum was paid out.

Vivium will send this to your home address by post.

You can request a copy by sending an email to FIB-EB@vivium.be. Vivium will email you a copy of your official tax document.

The official tax document (281.11) shows the amounts on which the advance tax payment was based and the total advance tax payment itself.

The amounts on which the advance tax payment was based are lower than the gross benefit, because no professional advance tax payment has to be paid on the solidarity contributions and the contribution to the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance.

If you requested an advance payment to buy or renovate a property for personal use as your sole residence, the final tax is levied according to the system of ‘notional amount’.

If you also continue to work until the statutory retirement age or until your career spans 45 years, the ‘notional amount’ only applies to 80% of the advance payment amount, which results in an additional tax benefit. That benefit is limited to a maximum of €85,430 in 2022. If the amount of the advance payment is greater than the maximum, the surplus will be subject to the normal tax.

A numerical example clarifies this

Suppose that you continue to work until the statutory retirement age or until your career spans 45 years. Your final reserves are €200,000 and your profit share is €10,000. You requested one advance payment on your capital of €100,000, which has not been paid back yet.

Net payout without ‘notional amount’:

Net payout with 'notional amount':

The normal advance tax payment of 10.09% does not apply to the first €85,430. That part is only subject to ‘notional amount’ and is calculated as follows:

• 80% of €85,430 is €68,344.
• You have to declare 5% of this to the personal income tax authorities for 10 years. That is €3,417.20 every time.
• The advance tax payment on the payout is 11.11% of that sum, which is €379.65.