The board of Pensioenfonds Hoogovens has decided to increase pensions by 5.8 per cent in two stages.

Dated back to January 2022, pensions will increase by 1.38 per cent and will increase by 4.42 per cent in August 2022. The increase comes as the rules around increasing pensions in the Netherlands have been relaxed, which the board said it had decided to take advantage of, in light of the rise in the cost of living.

On 1 January 2022, the pension fund granted a partial increase of 3.68 per cent. Despite this pension increase, pensions were 1.38 per cent behind price development in 2021. Therefore, the board has now decided to increase pensions by a further 1.38 per cent as of January 2022.

In the first half of 2022, prices rose by 4.42 per cent, which is why the board has decided to increase pensions again.

“Based on our good financial situation and the amended legislation, we will therefore increase the pensions with the full price increase for the first half of 2022 as of 1 August 2022. In this way, we are fulfilling our ambition to have pensions fully follow inflation in the Netherlands. This increase means that the pensions have been increased by 9.75% from the end of 2021 to August 2022,” the board stated.

At the end of the year, the pension fund will assess whether pensions can be increased in line with the price increase over the second half of 2022.

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