This is a pension through employment.  ABP is a Collective pension fund for employers within the Educational and Civil service.

Your pension scheme is a Defined Benefit scheme. This means your pension is based on a formula linked to average earnings over the accrual period and length of employment. The benefit is taken as point of departure. Monthly contributions are made towards your pension by you, 1/3 of the contributions, and by your employer, 2/3 of the contributions.

Your Multi-Option Pension offers you many alternatives. You don’t have to limit yourself to one choice; you can combine them all. All choices are to be made when you reach your chosen retirement age and apply for your pension.

Your retirement age can be between the ages of 60 to 72. The earlier you stop working, the lower your ABP pension will be – and the longer you continue to work, the higher your pension will be.

It is also possible to retire partially and continue to work part-time. The minimum percentage of pension you can apply for is 10%. The accrual of your pension will continue partially in relation to your part-time employment.

Another choice you can make is to vary the amount of pension you receive during a certain period. You can opt for a higher pension until your state pension age and a lower pension after your state pension age. It is also possible to opt for a lower pension for example until state pension age. You will receive a higher pension after state pension age. There is a maximum / minimum amount and a set period you can apply these choices. The amount is maximized / minimalized by fiscal restrictions and the maximum age is 78.

You can also exchange the Surviving Dependants Pension. Your pension will be higher if you sacrifice (a part of) the Surviving Dependants Pension, or you can lower your pension and increase the Surviving Dependants Pension. The benefit your partner receives in case of your death will then be higher. All choices can only be made at retirement age and cannot be adjusted.

If you move house within or to the Netherlands, we will be automatically notified of this via your municipal authorities. You do not need to inform us of your move.

If you move to an address outside the Netherlands (either from the Netherlands or from another non-Dutch address in the event you already live abroad), you must pass on your new address details to the RNI. Also inform the SVB

If you have accrued a pension in the Netherlands before and you wish to transfer this to ABP, you must submit an accrued benefits transfer request via Mijnwaardeoverdracht.nl. You will then receive confirmation of your request from us. At this point, the transfer cannot yet be completed. If the policy funding ratio of both pension providers is 100% or more, you will receive a quote from us. The accrued benefits transfer will only be conducted once you agree to this quote. 

Your new pension as well as your personal situation and your needs, will determine whether value transfer is a good choice for you, ABP cannot advise you in this. It is useful to compare your new and old pension schemes and ask yourself the following questions:

• At what age can you stop working?
• How will your pension scheme change? 
• Will it follow price or wage developments?
• Do you have individual options?
• What is your survivors’ pension scheme?
• Do you bear any investment risk?
• Will future wage increases have a continued effect within your ‘old’ pension scheme after value transfer?

You may be able to take your pension abroad with you. You can transfer it to the Pension Scheme of the European Communities (PSEC), for example, to which the European Parliament, the European Commission, and the European Court of Auditors belong. You can also transfer your pension to an international organization (such as NATO, the UN, or Europol) or to a pension provider within or outside Europe. Check with them if they will submit a request for the international transfer of accrued benefits for you. After receiving the request, ABP will return a statement showing the value of your accrued pension rights. Pension funds abroad and some international organizations will need to complete a ‘Model Questionnaire for the International Transfer of Accrued Benefits’. This organization will then forward it to ABP:

ABP
Postbus 4804
6401 JL Heerlen, The Netherlands

We will check whether the requirements for the international transfer of accrued benefits have been met.

If you become ill or disabled for work under your current or previous ABP employer, you will not have to take action in the first two years of your illness. Everything at ABP will continue as normal. You only need to take action with regard to your pension once you have been unfit for work for over two years. 

Are you going to get married, cohabit or enter a registered partnership? If so, go for more information on when you need to pass on this information to us. 

Are you getting a divorce or ending a registered partnership? If so, you will have to make decisions regarding how your old age pension and surviving dependants' pension will be distributed. Which options are open to you in this regard and what you need to do depends on your personal situation.

Were you unmarried and did you register your partner with ABP? If so, then deregister your partner via MijnABP. Your ex-partner is not entitled to a share of your old age pension, although he/she may be entitled to a share of your surviving dependants' pension. 

The surviving dependants' pension is the pension that your partner and children receive in the event of your death. This is known as the ABP Surviving Dependants' Pension. Whether or not your partner receives a surviving dependants' pension depends on a number of factors.

Important: If you live in the Netherlands, the municipality will inform us of your death. If you live abroad, your surviving relatives will have to inform us of your death by providing a death certificate. We will do everything we can to ensure the surviving dependants' pension is organised as soon as possible. 

At ABP, every participant builds up a survivor's pension, even if there is no partner registered. If there is no partner on the commencement date of the pension, we will increase your old-age pension with the survivor's pension that has been accrued since July 1, 1999.

It’s a collective pension, that means that all the money for the pension is put into a collective pension savings pot. All payouts also come from the same capital. An advantage of this system is that it is cheaper for everyone. A disadvantage is that if someone dies prematurely, the accrued pension remains in the collective pension savings pot.

Life events | ABP

Avoid double taxation. You pay tax on your pensions in the Netherlands. You may also have to pay tax on your pension in the country you live in. The Netherlands has made agreements with a number of countries. These agreements have been incorporated into tax treaties. In these treaties, the countries in question arrange their tax jurisdictions. You may ask the Dutch Tax and Customs Administration for an exemption from income tax deductions as this will prevent you from paying tax in both countries.

In order to assess where you must pay tax, the Tax and Customs Administration will require you to provide an overview of your duty period. This can be found via MijnABP. Send this overview, together with a letter containing your application for exemption from paying tax in the Netherlands, to the Tax and Customs Administration's International Department (Afdeling Buitenland). The address is

P.O. Box 2865,

6401 DJ Heerlen.

The telephone number is +31 555 385 385.

ABP will buy out your pension if the gross amount per year is lower than €592,51 and if you have given permission for ABP to buy out your pension. In this case, you will receive all of your pension benefits in one lump sum. We will pay out this lump sum in the month in which you reach the state pension age.

With ABP ExtraPensioen you save for extra pension. This is possible as long as you work and you accrue a pension with ABP through your employer.

You may deposit an amount from your gross salary through your employer. We add this 'contribution' to ABP's assets. As long as you accrue a pension with ABP, your contribution will receive the same return as the ABP fund assets. You increase your retirement pension with the final balance (your contribution and the return achieved).

In mijnabp you can immediately calculate what your contribution will yield in terms of retirement pension. You can log in safely and quickly with your DigiD.

Is your fiscal space not visible in mijnabp? Contact our customer service,  and request to have your fiscal space calculated 

You are legally allowed to build up an amount of pension tax-free. The fiscal room is the difference between this amount and the amount that you are already accruing in pension. The contribution to your ABP ExtraPension may not exceed the fiscal space.

The amount of fiscal room is different for everyone. For many employees who accrue pension with ABP, the fiscal room has already been almost fully utilized. You can see the amount of the fiscal room in MyABP, every year from mid-March/April. Is no amount shown here? Then you can contact customer service.

Then you may supplement your pension accrual for a maximum of 3 years after your dismissal date.

Have you started your own business or are you self-employed? Then you may supplement your pension accrual for 10 years. You must have profits from business within the meaning of Article 3.8 of the Income Tax Act 2001.

On May 30 2023 , the Dutch Senate passed the Future of Pensions Act (Wet toekomst pensioenen, Wtp). This new law ensures that pensions are better suited to the demands of our times. The legislation will apply to all pension funds in the Netherlands. The strengths of today’s pension system will be retained. That means you will continue to receive a state pension (AOW) from the government. Also, you and your employer will continue to pay in pension contributions towards a lifelong pension. Pension Fund ABP will invest these contributions to increase the pension assets.

The biggest change is that, under the new rules, you will accrue personal pension assets from which your lifelong pension will be paid when you retire, rather than paying into a collective pension pot. Personal pension assets give you more insight into the pension you have accrued.

In addition, investment results will have a bigger impact on the amount of your personal pension assets. This means that your pension will fluctuate. It will rise when the economy is strong, but it will fall during economic downturns. There will be rules in place to ensure that pensions do not decrease too much. We will ensure that we have enough funds in reserve to prevent an excessive drop in the amount of your pension. You will not notice any of these changes in the near future. The Future of Pensions Act will take effect from July 1, 2023, but pension funds will have a few years to transition to the new pension rules. We will keep you informed of the steps we take. You can find the latest information on our website New pension rules (abp.nl) .