Occupational pension schemes (bAV) are highly complex from a legal point of view. This is particularly evident at the many different levels of regulation. Occupational pension schemes are affected by insurance and labour law, tax law, social security law, insolvency law and family law. This complexity is further increased by changing and newly introduced legislation.
As a pension provider or employer, we provide you with legal expertise pertaining to insurance matters of occupational pensions. As part of our holistic advisory approach, we will certainly assist you with all legal questions in connection with the specific provisions of German law, including the Law on the Improvement of Occupational Pension Schemes (BetrAVG), the Insurance Contract Act of 2008 (VVG), the Law on the Supervision of Insurance Companies (VAG), the Works Constitution Act (BetrVG), the Social Code (SGB), the Commercial Code (HGB), the Income Tax Law (EStG) and the Insolvency Code (InsO).
We consistently focus on your needs as a pension provider or employer. We have considerable expertise and experience in the area of pension providers organised under private law, such as life insurers, pension offices, pension funds and provident funds. In addition, we have gathered experience with the special features of public supplementary pensions over many years.
In order to avoid conflicts of interest, we do not take on cases for employees or other pension beneficiaries.
In contrast to many other areas of law, occupational pension schemes require constructive solutions that take into account the interests of all parties involved. This is due to the fact that in this complex legal context, numerous questions arise in practice which have not been resolved by the highest courts. The often conflicting positions in legal opinion must be taken into account and examined for their practical suitability.
The BLD consulting concept offers you a broad range of services including:
- Development of pension schemes, including the development and/or testing of indirect pension plans as well as the design of employee information.
- Ongoing analysis of existing benefit plans by providing ongoing advice and information on current legal developments.
- Development and/or review of general insurance conditions, statutes, benefit plans, etc. in the field of occupational pension schemes.
- Review and support of the transfer of vested rights in the event of a change of employer, (partial) transfer of business and departure of employees.
- Establishment, review and restructuring of executive pension schemes.
- Review and, if necessary, restructuring of existing pension obligations and coverage concepts, including harmonisation of the implementation channels in the company up to and including a change of pension provider.
In individual cases, our occupational pension team is strengthened by the proven labour and tax law expert Prof Dr Mathias Ulbrich, LLM, who we turn to with your consent.
