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Pensions Schemes for Teachers and Non-teaching Staff
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These handbooks serve as an information resource on the superannuation provisions applying to:
- Teaching staff paid directly by the Department of Education
- Non-Teaching Staff paid directly by the Department of Education
They provide a guide to the provisions of the Superannuation Acts and various other circulars and letters governing the pension terms applicable to members of each scheme.
Cost Neutral Early Retirement is a retirement option that allows teachers and non-teaching staff to retire early with immediate payment of pension benefits.
Benefits may be payable to spouses of teachers and non-teaching staff.
The Pensions Estimator (or Modeller) is available for school staff who receive salary directly from this department and are in membership of a pension scheme.
This department operates a commercial bank account in order to receive payments from a variety of sources.
Notional Service is a scheme that allows serving teachers and certain non-teaching staff who will have less than 40 years pensionable service at retirement aged 60 or 65 (65 years of age only in the case of a new entrant and teachers who are not new entrants have an additional option to purchase to age 60 ) to purchase certain additional pensionable service.
A preserved pension may be payable to a teacher, special needs assistant, certain caretakers and certain clerical officers who were members of the department’s pension scheme and have resigned but only have an entitlement to retirement benefits from the age of 60 or 65 if a new entrant.
The Single Pension Scheme is based on a career averaging model.
Refund of pensions contributions may be payable to teachers and non-teaching staff who have resigned without entitlement to superannuation benefits and wish to apply for a refund of superannuation contributions.
Teachers or non-teaching staff, while in pensionable service, may apply for retirement pension benefit on medical grounds.
An Occupational Supplementary Pension is payable in certain circumstances to persons who paid Class A PRSI during the course of their employment.
Teachers and non-teaching staff may, in certain circumstances, transfer their previous public sector pension entitlements to their current scheme.
Voluntary/Compulsory is a retirement option that allows teachers and non-teaching staff to retire with payment of pension benefits without actuarial reduction.
The Procedures and processes for the pension unit to hold your personal information changed in May 2018.
Under the Data Protection Act of 2018 and the EU data protection laws known as GDPR, the pensions unit of this Department has responsibility for protecting your personal information. To do this we have listed below the legal basis for the pension unit to hold your information and the privacy notices listed below explains what the pension unit specifically does with your information for each different process of your pension application or query.
The pensions unit to balance the obligations of the Department under the law as holders of your personal information (Known as Data Controllers) and our responsibility to you to safeguard your information will not share or release your personal information to any 3rd party, such as an insurance company/ tax advisor, even if you have signed a form with that company for them to seek your information from the pension unit. What the pension unit will do is to issue the information requested by a company directly to you and then you can decide if you wish to release your information to the company. There is an exception to this process in the case of Family Law matters.
It should also be known that the pension unit do NOT hold medical records of teachers / / Non- teaching staff and where copies of medical records are required , you should contact the Occupational Health Service Providers , who are currently MEDMARK LTD. Their advice line is: 1890 235 711.
The Legal Basis by which the Department holds your personal data is available in this PDF:
Legal basis for pensions schemes for teachers and non-teaching staff
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Department of Education Data Protection Policy. Click to read the department's Data Protection Policy.
Pensions privacy policies Learn more out the department's personal data privacy notices applied by its pension unit.
All Spouses’ and Children’s Pension Schemes are contributory. Spouses’ and Children’s pension contributions are in addition to contributions that may be required under the member’s main scheme
Both the Original and the Revised Schemes provide for payment of a pension to the legal spouse of the member and, where applicable, eligible children in the event of the member’s death.
A spouse’s pension may be payable following the death of a member, to the member’s surviving legal spouse. The rate of pension payable will depend on the benefits accrued by the deceased member and generally comprises 50% of the deceased member’s pension. The method of calculating the deceased member’s pension will depend on whether the member died in service, in retirement or with a preserved pension benefit prior to reaching their preserved pension age, and on their PRSI classification.
Note: where a Pension Adjustment Order (PAO) is made against either the deceased member’s pension and/or the spousal pension benefit, this will impact on the Spouses’ and Children’s benefits payable.
Circular 23/2022 notified the arrangements in place relating to a limited appeals process to review a past option not to join a Spouses’ and Children's Pension Scheme in particular circumstances. This is referred to as the ‘limited appeals mechanism’. A review under this mechanism will be assessed according to one of the following criteria:
- there is no evidence that an option to join the Spouses’ and Children's Pension Scheme was provided to the individual at the time of the options exercise,
- there is medical evidence that the individual was of unsound mind when they declined to join the Spouses’ and Children's Pension Scheme, and as a result did not appreciate the consequences of their decision; or
- where a member of the Original Scheme declined to join the Revised Scheme, as there would have been no reasonably foreseeable adverse financial consequences for them (regarding scheme contributions) had they opted to join.
Where one of the criteria above are met, and the appeal is deemed successful based on a review of the evidence presented, the appellant will be given a new, time-limited option to join the Spouses’ and Children's Pension Scheme, subject to the payment of any such contributions owed.
Further details are set out in Circular 0023/2022