The Dutch pension fund for the supermarket chain company Ahold Delhaize is gearing up for changes in its fiduciary management as it wants to separate asset management and manager selection in the future.
Ahold Delhaize Pensioen – which uses AXA Investment Managers as its current fiduciary – expects to make an announcement on this early next year.
Additionally, it will outsource its pension administration to Achmea Pension Services as of 1 January 2022, the €5.7bn fund announced.
The scheme executes the pension arrangements for some 90,000 (former) employees of supermarket chain Albert Heijn, liquor chain Gall & Gall and chemist chain Etos. The fund currently takes care of its pension administration in house.
Renate Pijst, director of the Ahold Delhaize pension fund, said in a press release that the switch to Achmea is “a huge step forward for our online service level”.
The new software that will be provided by Inadmin RiskCo, a company that was acquired by Achmea and pension fund PGB last summer, will facilitate a digital platform where members can arrange all their pension business online, according to Pijst.
She emphasised the switch to Achmea was not motivated by a move to cut costs. She does, however, expect costs will eventually come down. Last year, Ahold Delhaize Pensioen spent €5.4m on pension administration, or €115 per member (active members and pensioners only).
The pension fund’s search for a suitable administrator took more than a year. An important reason to select Achmea was that its ‘vision on customer experience is fully in line with ours; namely wanting to do better and better for our participants’, Pijst said.
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