Unilever closes final salary pension scheme
Unilever, the food and household goods giant, became the latest firm to announce plans to close its final salary pension scheme
Scheme axed: 'Bad news' for staff banking on a certain level of pension
The Anglo-Dutch business, which makes global brands Dove soap and Magnum ice cream, said it will begin a 90-day consultation with staff over the scheme, which has 7,000 members.
It has a £680m deficit and was closed to new members in 2008.
Unilever becomes the latest in a long line of big firms in recent years to withdraw its final-salary pension, which was once seen as attractive perk of joining a large company.
Asda, Northern Rock, Aviva, Taylor Wimpey and Tate & Lyle have all closed their final salary schemes, which are now seen as too expensive to run, because staff live far longer than actuaries had envisioned.
Unilever says it plans to replace its final salary scheme with two defined benefit options by January 2012.
The firm's UK & Ireland chairman Amanda Sourry said: 'the changes have been proposed to help tackle the increasingly unaffordable and unsustainable costs associated with Unilever's UK pension fund.'
In February Unilever reported a full-year pre-tax profit up 18% to €6.1bn in 2010, while its sales rose 11.1% to €44.3bn.
Roger Turner, chief executive of the lobby group the occupational Pensioners' Alliance, said: 'This is pretty bad news for someone at Unilever's who is in their 40s and had expected a certain level of pension, and now has very little time to do much about it.'
Turner added: 'Companies are pretty hellbent on closing their final salary schemes. Time is running out on them.'
The shares closed down 11p at 1915p.
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