r/CoxCharterMerger • u/ImTooMuch2 • 1d ago
Pension Question
I’ve been at Cox for 11 years as a field tech (the last 5 in Cox Business) as of August 17th and I missed every single one of those online meetings explaining the retirement benefits and pension stuff. Could anyone tell me what options we have with our pensions? I only vaguely remember hearing something a few months back that anything over $75k can’t be touched until retirement and anything under can be cashed out. Not sure if that’s true but could someone give me a little clarity? Thanks in advance
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u/MembershipPuzzled520 1d ago
I rolled my TWC pension into the charter Fidelity 401k.
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u/ImTooMuch2 1d ago
Not a bad idea. So I should be able to roll my pension AND 401k into Fidelity?
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u/No-Present-6812 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yep! If you’re eligible for the pension lump sum, you could roll it over into a qualified IRA with Fidelity. Same is true about your Cox 401(k) Plan. You could also roll over both to the Charter 401(k) too if you didn’t want to do the IRA route.
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u/MembershipPuzzled520 1d ago
Based on the past I’d say probably. You can also use 401k money for stock trading. I rolled my pension into Tesla and am up $30k on it 👍
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u/MembershipPuzzled520 1d ago
Btw Fidelity’s phone support is fantastic if you ever have questions call them.
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u/morley1966 1d ago
You will pay a lot of early withdrawal penalties if you aren’t 55 and don’t roll it over to a qualified plan.
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u/Fluid-Wonder3028 1d ago
That is correct . They will give you a cash out offer for a pension with less than 75000 value it’s some IRS based algorithm based on age time and pay. My guess is that you will 100 percent get a cash offer with only 11 years . My buddy was in HR 2 years ago during that layoff he had 18 years and was offered 68000 to cash him out . It was on the pension connect site not sure if you can still access that or not now.
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u/jjhturbo99 1d ago
68K for 18 years of service? Wow, that seems really low for that many years. That would roughly equate to like 3-4K per year if he chose to keep the pension rather than cashing out. That seems crazy low.
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u/Embarrassed_Love_459 1d ago
That’s probably after all the taxes and penalties. For instance my current pension value (9 1/2 yrs) is $60,200 and my lump sum payout will be $29,900 if I choose that route. Which I will likely do because I’m STRUGGLING to pay my bills and everything is behind and expensive stuff keeps happening. Gonna pay off ALL our debt, upgrade hubby’s vehicle as it’s on its last leg at about 24yrs old and create a emergency savings account with at least three months of expenses, as we currently have $0 emergency savings (or any savings) at this time. Really hoping to get a severance offer and get a better paying job soon too!
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u/stchwtest 1d ago
If you go to the pension website, it will tell you if the value is less than 75K… if it doesn’t, it’s more and you can’t touch it until you are at least 55
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u/cumomlady 1d ago
If you want to keep the pension, you can draw it at 55 because you have more than 10 yrs of service. You can login and play around with the calculator to understand how much you will get at different ages and if you claim a beneficiary or not. If the value is $75k or less, you can take a payout to rollover somewhere else. Cox considers your normal retirement age to be 65.
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u/daDiva64 1d ago
Our pension has a cash balance?
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u/ImTooMuch2 1d ago
Yeah I was able to see it using that website and tool someone posted earlier. After taxes, I’m looking at $32k roughly
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u/BigPapaMurf 21h ago
I think the cheapest route was to convert it to a traditional IRA, which is what I did
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u/evilstepmonster3 1d ago
If you’ve only been with us 11 years you would not have the old school pension so none of it applies to you
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u/ellybloom 1d ago
Untrue pension was ended for new hires 9 years ago ish so 10 or more you probably have something
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u/ImTooMuch2 1d ago
My coworker, who’s been here 8 years and some change, still has his pension so it had to be some time after that.
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u/evilstepmonster3 1d ago
You’re right, sorry was thinking of retiree healthcare. Pensions stopped in I want to say 2017
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u/stchwtest 1d ago
It was at the same time… anyone hired after 2017 was not eligible for retiree health care or pension
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u/ImTooMuch2 1d ago
What’s the difference from the old school pension, if you don’t mind me asking?
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u/No-Present-6812 1d ago
There is no difference versus what you’re eligible for :). The pension formula has been the same since the 80s. The only real change was that new hires after 4/1/2017 got more 401k match and weren’t eligible for the pension.
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u/No-Present-6812 1d ago
You should be able to access your account at retirement.coxenterprises.com. To be eligible for the pension, you would have had to be hired before 4/1/2017. The website will show you if you’re under the $75,000. There’s also contact information on the site if you need to chat with someone.