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Marketing Pension Alert from OPM

June 19, 2017

Latest Alert from OPM’s Retirement Services

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) recently alerted annuitants of a particularly aggressive company offering retirees cash in return for some or all of their federal annuity. The cash payment being offered according to OPM is worth much less than the long term worth of annuities and comes with high interest rates and fees. Click here to read the OPM alert.

OPM has specifically received numerous phone calls from one company in particular asking not only for verification of annuity amounts, but also banking information, including routing numbers and account numbers. The OPM Office of Inspector General discovered this company is currently under investigation by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

CFPB lists three things you can do to protect your retirement annuity:

  1. Avoid loans with high fees and interest. Pension advance companies may not always advertise their fees and interest rates, but you will certainly feel them in your bottom line. Before you sign anything, learn what you are getting and how much you are giving up.
  2. Don’t sign over control of your benefits. Companies sometimes arrange for monthly payments to be automatically deposited in a newly created bank account so the company can withdraw payments, fees and interest charges from the account. This leaves you with little control.
  3. Don’t buy life insurance that you don’t want or need. Pension advance companies sometimes require consumers to sign up for life insurance with the company as the consumer’s beneficiary. If you sign up for life insurance with the pension advance company as your beneficiary, you could end up footing the bill, whether you know it or not.

Go to www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/blog/c consumer-advisory-3-pension-advance-traps-to-avoid/ for more information.

Please report any suspected scams to the OPM Office of Inspector General (OIG) at:

OIG Hotline Number

877-499-7295

Or Write to

OPM Office of the Inspector General
1900 E Street NW Room #6400
Washington, DC 20415-1100

Or Submit a Complaint Form

Hotline Complaint Form