NETHERLANDS - PH&C, the €2bn pension fund for the Horeca Dutch hotel and catering sector, says its administrative arrangement with the Dutch Tax Department and Employees' Insurance Institute (UWV) is still not functioning.

"Consequently, we cannot make a correct calculation of the premium which the employer need to pay," spokeswoman Nicolette Drop told IPE today.

Implementation of the initiative had already been postponed from January 2006 to the beginning of this year. It's intended to make employers' administration of the scheme simpler by making use of a central administration system to process employment data.

PH&C now says that software problems at UWV and the Tax Department are preventing the scheme being implemented.

Despite receiving some data, the fund says it doesn't work well enough yet for it to be able to use as a base for administration.

The problems have forced PH&C for now to calculate the premiums on data from 2005 and the few figures the fund has received under the new system so far.

Drop expects that UWV and the Tax Department will have resolved the problem by this summer.

Earlier this year, employers met the fund's new money collection policy with some concerns, when the fund asked employers to pay their pension contributions via a direct debit.

Some employers feared the prospect of hefty fines and ultimately even bankruptcy, as a consequence of non-payment if their direct debit account has insufficient funds.

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