Changes to the amount of your pension

Once your pension starts, you will continue to receive a lifetime pension from the Plan. However, the amount of your monthly pension may be adjusted due to one or more of the following reasons:

• Income tax adjustments
  Your pension is taxable income. As such, tax is deducted from your monthly pension based on government income tax tables. Because government tax tables are adjusted from time-to-time, the amount of tax deducted from your pension is adjusted accordingly.
• The end of bridging benefits
  If your pension started before age 65, and depending on the Plan rules in effect at that time, you may be receiving a bridging benefit from the Plan. Keep in mind that this bridging benefit stops as soon as you turn age 65 (or upon your death, if that occurs sooner). Regardless of the type of bridging benefit you are receiving, the end of your bridging benefit is designed to coincide with your eligibility for government benefits – which normally start at age 65.
• Inflation protection
  To help protect the buying power of your pension once it starts, the NSAHO Pension Plan provides guaranteed cost-of-living adjustments (COLA).
  Each January 1st, your monthly lifetime pension (and your monthly bridging benefit, if provided for in the Plan rules that were in effect at the time your pension started) will be adjusted by 100% of the increase in the previous year’s cost-of-living index, up to a maximum of 3% per year. To measure the year-over-year increase in the cost of living, we use the Consumer Price Index (CPI) figures for Canada as of each September 30th. (Note: your first COLA will be prorated if you did not receive your pension for the full 12 months in the first year.)
  If the year-over-year increase in the CPI exceeds the 3% maximum covered by the Plan, the Board of Trustees will consider whether further increases for any amount over 3% will be granted.

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