Pre-Retirement Access to Retirement Fund Savings: Change of Implementation Date – 1 March 2024

It was previously reported that National Treasury proposed to Parliament’s standing committee on Finance that the implementation date be delayed until 1 March 2025, in order to give the retirement fund industry more time to make the administrative changes necessary to implement the system.

The standing committee on Finance has however rejected National Treasury’s proposal and has insisted that the two-pot system must be implemented on 1 March 2024.

It must however be noted that retirement funds that are not ready by 1 March 2024, will be allowed to request National Treasury for an extension for up to 1 year, to implement the system.

The standing committee has however accepted National Treasury’s proposal to increase the amount that will immediately be available for withdrawal by R 5000.00 to R 30 000.00. Moreover, persons that are 55 years and older on 1 March 2024 will, by default, be excluded from the system. They must explicitly choose to opt in.

As it stands therefore, the draft legislation must be amended as follows:

There is still an outstanding procedural matter. The Minister of Finance has 14-days to respond to the new amendments and may make another attempt to convince the standing committee to delay the implementation date. Once the Minister has responded, a final decision can be made regarding the implementation date.

We will keep members informed of further developments.