Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation
The federal agency that pays pensions when the employer's plan has failed — and holds pensions nobody claimed.
What it means
A traditional employer pension is insured. When a plan is terminated without enough money to meet its promises, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation takes it over and pays benefits, up to a guaranteed maximum that depends on the year of termination and the age at which payments start.
For a family this matters in two ways. The first is that a pension from an employer that no longer exists has not necessarily vanished — the agency has almost certainly taken it on, and the survivor's benefit under it is payable in the ordinary way.
The second is the unclaimed pensions search. The agency holds benefits for people it has been unable to trace, from plans that ended years ago, and the search is free and public. It is one of the small number of searches worth running for anybody who worked a long career in an industry that consolidated.
Multiemployer plans — union plans covering several employers — are insured under a separate program with a different and lower guarantee.
Why it matters
"That company went under, so the pension is gone" is one of a frequent and most costly wrong beliefs a family holds.
The unclaimed benefits search finds money nobody was looking for, and costs nothing to run.
When you are likely to meet it
- When somebody worked for an employer that closed, merged or went bankrupt.
- When a survivor's pension benefit has to be claimed and the plan's administrator cannot be found.
- When reconstructing a work history to see what is owed.
Related terms
Official sources
The authority this page describes, at the agency that publishes it. Sahvelo does not restate a rule from a secondary source.