Information for retirees and dependants

Pensions payable to you and your dependants are paid monthly and in advance to the bank account you (or your dependant) have indicated to the Administrator of RWE Group, WTW. All payments of benefits are made by the Administrator of RWE Group, WTW, on behalf of the Group Trustees.

Pensions payable to you and your dependants will be increased annually to protect against inflation.

Generally, pensions are increased by reference to the increase in the retail prices index. Where the annual increase in the retail prices index is greater than 5% the Principal Employer may decide to cap the annual increase at a lower percentage no less than 5%.

The pension payable to you or your dependants that represents Guaranteed Minimum Pension (GMP) earned from 6 April 1988 is increased annually in line with the legal requirements applying to GMPs. This is currently the increase in the consumer prices index, capped at 3%. GMP earned before that date is not increased.

Increases to pensions in payment are applied on 1st April each year. A proportionate increase is paid where a pension has been in payment for less than a year.

On your death, the Main Section will provide pension and/or lump sum benefits to others on your behalf in certain circumstances.

Your personal representatives must notify the Administrator of RWE Group, WTW of your death by completing a notice of bereavement. They can do this on the online Bereavement Hub or by contacting The Bereavement Support Service, PO Box 545, Redhill, Surrey, RH1 1YX or via email.

The team will stop your pension payments and calculate any dependants’ benefits at that time. If there is a delay in the team being notified of your death, the team may need to recover any payments made to your account in the meantime.

If you die in receipt of a pension from the Main Section, the following benefits are payable:

• Lump sum: if you die within five years of your retirement under the Main Section, a lump sum equal to the balance of pension that you would have received had you lived for five years from your date of retirement, with interest.

  The Group Trustees have discretion over who receives any lump sum benefit payable on your death. They can consider, but cannot be bound by, your wishes. You can indicate your wishes by completing/updating a form in the ‘Update beneficiaries’ section of LIFETRACK.

• Spouses's pension: a pension for your Spouse of 58% of the pension you were receiving at the date of your death (or if you exercised the option to give up some of your pension on retirement in return for a lump sum or increased dependant’s pension on your death, the pension you would have been receiving if you had not exercised that option).

  If, before you died, you had no Spouse but were in a relationship closely resembling marriage with a person who was your Financial Dependant, the Spouse’s pension is paid to that person.

  If there is no such person, the Group Trustees can decide, at their discretion, to pay up to the amount of the Spouse’s pension to one or more of your Financial Dependants, if any.

• Children's allowance: a pension to each of your Qualifying Children of the higher of 25% of the Spouse’s pension calculated as set out above and a cash amount which increases each year in the same way as pensions in payment. As at 1st April 2024, the cash amount was £4,230.90.

  If a pension, calculated as set out in the Spouse’s pension section above, is not paid to the person taking care of your Qualifying Children, the amount of pension for each of your Qualifying Children is increased to the higher of 37.5% of the Spouse’s pension and 150% of the cash amount described above.

  If you have more than four Qualifying Children, the children’s allowance payable will be four times the children’s allowance as calculated above, shared between all of your Qualifying Children. 

If you retired due to ill-health, the lump sum payment is different to that set out above.

• If you joined the Main Section on or after 1st October 1991 and die after Normal Pension Age, it is as set out above but without taking into account the part of your pension that was provided in consequence of your ill-health.

• Otherwise, it is the lump sum that would have been payable had you died as a Contributing Member on the date you retired, excluding interest, less the lump sum and pension payments (excluding any increases) made to you to the date you died.