LATEST NEWS

06 January 2025
Pension Justice is amicus in a matter before the Constitutional Court that concerns the distribution of pension benefits to the surviving dependents of the deceased worker. The case was argued on 12 November 2024. On 12 December 2024, the Court issued directives for further submissions. Read the Court’s directives here and our further submissions here.
03 December 2024
On 3 December 2024, Pension Justice with Open Secrets participated in the Public Interest Law Gathering sharing the difficulties of litigating against corporations, methods of claiming unpaid benefits and new openings for litigation on behalf of pension beneficiaries. We have created short videos from the presentation. Please see our Resources page and watch what is useful to you.
12 November 2024
On 2 August 2024, Pension Justice was directed to file submissions as amicus curiae in the Constitutional Court. We sought to help the court with submissions on the genesis and purpose of section 37C of the Pension Funds Act and the powers of pension fund boards and the Pension Funds Adjudicator. Listen to the case here.
4 to 5 October 2024
Pension Justice and Open Secrets participate in a conference of the Unpaid Benefits Campaign, the federation of community-based activists fighting for beneficiaries of pension funds who have yet to be paid by funds and administrators. The UBC also had Liberty, the FSCA and SAFTU at the conference. Our legal presentation is available.
2 August 2024
Pension justice was directed by the Constitutional Court to file submissions as amicus curiae in Mutsila v Municipal Gratuity Fund. Read our submissions here, detailing the history, purpose and practical implications of the system for distribution of benefits for beneficiaries like family members and dependents of pension fund members.
9 May 2024
Pension Justice has filed an application to the Constitutional Court in a case involving a widow’s claim to death benefits of her late spouse, who was a member of the Municipal Gratuity Fund. The widow, Mrs Mutsila, is challenging the decision of the fund and the Pension Funds Adjudicator on the distribution of death benefits, saying she has been unfairly treated in the distribution. Mrs Mutsila lost her case in the Supreme Court of Appeal and her case will be heard by the Constitutional Court. Pension Justice seeks to make submissions on the purpose of death benefit distributions and the nature of the adjudicator’s decisions.
8 February 2024
Pension Justice has been providing advice to community offices and paralegals who often make enquiries on behalf of members or beneficiaries who lack the resources to do so themselves. Among the problems advices offices and paralegals face is that fund administrators do not assist them. We have prepared a standard power of attorney form that can be used and our legal advice setting out why the power of attorney is a valid legal document authorising an advice office or paralegal to inquire into claims on behalf of members or beneficiaries.
18 October 2023
Unpaid Benefits Campaign holds its AGM, bringing together branches across Gauteng to reflect on this year, and its past six years of relentless activism.
11 October 2023
The Office of the Pension Funds Adjudicator announced that in the 2022/2023 year, it received 3,771 complaints. As many as 2,477 matters related to employers who were deducting workers’ pension contributions from their salaries but keeping it for themselves instead of paying it over to funds. We explained how to monitor retirement fund contributions.

KEYWORDS

Beneficiary
Claim
Contributions
Death benefits
Member
Payment
Pension Fund Adjudicator
Unclaimed benefits
Withdrawal

ABOUT US

PENSION JUSTICE

Education | Information | Litigation

Pension Justice is a non-profit organisation which supports organisations and individuals in accessing and preserving pension and provident fund benefits. We are made up of a group of lawyers with combined experience in education, training, litigation, and who have specialised in labour, socio-economic rights and pension law.

Our work is premised on the beliefs that collective worker investment is a fundamental good, that workers or their beneficiaries must understand and be able to easily access these investments, and that there is relentless work required to ensure that the funds and employers operate for the benefit of workers and beneficiaries.