New fund rules would make clients 'pay' for pulling out of pensions

Investment funds (TFI) are planning to draw-up their pension fund (IKE) tariffs in such a way that it would be unprofitable for their clients to withdraw from a deal with the cost of such an operation being higher than the tax deduction connected with saving on a pension fund. The IKE law allows a company to level a financial penalty for breaking a pension fund agreement irrespective of whether a client just wants to withdraw his or her cash or switch to another TFI. The regulation states that a charge can be made if the agreement is broken within the first 12 months. The amount of the penalty is being kept secret for now. "We will reveal it on September 1st. Our proposals are still worked on by the Securities and Stock Exchange Commission (KPWiG)," said the head of PZU TFI's new products department Grzegorz Łętocha. It is unofficially known, however, that the penalty will amount to 50% of money saved on an individual IKE, but investment funds stress that they only want to protect themselves from losses caused by disloyal clients. KPWiG does not like the new proposals as they can be misleading for TFIs' clients. (Parkiet, p. 1) D.W.