Designating beneficiaries
Determining Eligible Recipients
This section summarizes the principles that determine the eligibility for death benefits and includes these topics:
Governing Legislation
Death benefit eligibility is determined by the PSPP and statutes such as:
- Ontario Pension Benefits Act
- Family Law Act, and
- Succession Law Reform Act.
How the beneficiary is determined
OPB identifies and pays the survivor and/or death benefits from the PSPP to the named beneficiaries provided by the member. Members can designate and update beneficiaries in e-services.
Death benefits from the PSPP are paid in order of priority, in accordance with the
- payment direction provided by the late member in their Beneficiary Designations,
- PSPP Plan text, and
- applicable statutes.
Beneficiary designation
This section describes how members designate and update their beneficiaries.
It includes these topics:
Events requiring members to update their beneficiary
Sample life events or changes:
- a change in marital status (marriage, commencement of a common-law relationship, separation, divorce, re-marriage), or
- the birth or adoption of a child(ren), or
- the death of
- a spouse/partner, or
- a child, or
- a person identified as a designated beneficiary, or
- a change in beneficiary(ies), or
- a change in estate trustee/executor, or
- a change in member status
- retirement or termination with deferred vested pension
Purpose of designating a beneficiary
Designating beneficiaries is important because it is how we determine eligibility for death benefits payable from the PSPP.
How to update your beneficiaries
Members can update their beneficiaries in e-services.