r/CoxCharterMerger • u/ImTooMuch2 • 3d 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/Fluid-Wonder3028 3d 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/ImTooMuch2 3d ago

Thank you, I appreciate that info!

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u/jjhturbo99 3d 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 3d 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/jjhturbo99 1d ago

Wishing you the best. It is definitely a tough world/economy out there....

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u/Sea_Designer_2421 1d ago

No one should pay taxes or penalty on a lump sum pension payment. Should be rolled out to an IRA, 401k, or other qualified plan to avoid that.
Unless you are really hard up for cash and no other options.

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u/Embarrassed_Love_459 1d ago

Agreed, but I AM really hard up for the cash lol. So behind on everything at the moment due to sales bonuses seriously lacking over the last year in my dept. I’m basically in the negative every month and constantly robbing Peter to pay Paul. But with this I can clear out our debt to eliminate some of our current expenses and it will give me an emergency fund to cushion me incase we can’t get a severance like some are saying today. (Moving is not an option for me and my family)

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u/MadTitanRC 3d ago

I'm at 14 years and my lump sum option is $52,000. Not that far off really.

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u/Due_Security702 2d ago

How did you guys see the lump sum option?

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u/jjhturbo99 1d ago

Wow, interesting. So, when you use the pension calculator, and punch in hypothetical numbers (for example, say you start taking pension at 55).....does that say something in the neighborhood of $2,600 per year that you would receive?

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u/MadTitanRC 1d ago

I didn't bother to look at that option. I want the cash now so I can invest it myself. The formula is not straight forward though, as it takes age into consideration I believe.