There’s a curious nexus of actions between the Pension Fund CEO, and the
AFICS/NY leadership that leaves us more concerned than ever about how the Fund
is being managed and how this may impact on the soundness of the Fund’s
operations.
We learned recently that the Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS)
initiated an audit regarding the Fund’s substantial backlog and processing
delays in payments to new retirees and survivors, and reportedly requested to
meet with the AFICS/NY leadership in this regard.
The meeting was soon followed by an email from the AFICS/NY President,
dated 1 June 2016, addressed to OIOS (full text below), copied to a number of
AFICS Governing Board members. The email calls into question the rationale of
OIOS even looking into the issue of the backlog and minimizes the impact on
retiring staff of the protracted delays while seeking to shift responsibility
to a variety of other factors, not in the control of the CEO. The AFICS leadership offers opinions about the
causes of the crisis; regrets that it did not have more advance information
about the audit; and asks for an opportunity to comment before the audit report
is finalized. AFICS/NY’s comments cover:
Timing: the timing
of the audit is inconvenient, they say, because it will require a "great deal
of effort” on the part of Pension Fund staff who need to focus on addressing
the backlog; and are already "demoralized by criticism from the staff unions
and others.” Since the audit won’t be completed until the end of the year, it
“will have little impact.”
Need: there’s no
agreement on what the terms "delays" and "backlog" mean, and “Further, it appears that there is no coordinated
data on the numbers and reasons for the delays which is why much of it remains
largely anecdotal.”
Cause of
the crisis: “. . any
delays in the early months of IPAS implementation were not solely the fault of
IPAS;” the Fund receives incomplete files for retirees
from separating organizations which sit for months; and the Fund "advised [new retirees] to set aside
extra funds in the event the new system caused undue and unexpected delays.”
Further, “noise” from the staff unions, i.e., “calling
it mismanagement on the part of the [the Fund’s] CEO and petitioning the SG to
terminate him. . . has clouded the issue and served only to spread fear and
anger.”
In closing, AFICS’ leadership says: “We feel that
this is a matter that must be treated on the basis of facts and unassailable
data alone and that the noise and commotion that have been stirred up is out of
order. Lastly, let me say only that we
could have had more fruitful consultations had we been privy to the scope of
your study in advance. When it is ready we would appreciate being
apprised as it may bring to mind further comment.” Of course, the efforts
of OIOS to get the unassailable facts are opposed by the AFICS leadership.
The petition to recall the CEO, initiated by CCISUA, contends that he
ignored advice about measures to address the backlog crisis, and was distracted
from his management functions by lobbying efforts to avoid an investigation
into allegations of mismanagement made against him by some Fund staff; and to implement
a revised Memorandum of Understanding that would privatize the Fund’s
operations and delegate to him full authority from the Secretary-General over
staff management on both sides of the Fund’s operations. Two petitions to the
Secretary-General (one initiated by the staff union’s and federations’ and
another by a group of retirees, and signed by a total of 16,000 Fund
participants and beneficiaries) contended that these measures carried the risk
of breaching the strict separation of the assets and liabilities sides of the
Fund, a cornerstone of the system of checks and balances that has kept the Fund
healthy when other funds have failed.
As with the current email to OIOS, the AFICS/NY leadership has
consistently dismissed concerns about the Fund’s management and steadfastly
supported the CEO’s position on both the MOU and his explanations for the
backlog. They have faithfully reposted
his progress updates on the AFICS/NY website, as if they were his official
spokespersons.
An open letter dated 9 April 2016 (posted on the blog) from the former
Chief of Entitlements of the Fund describes reports of the backlog as
‘selective and deceptive’ and calls on the UN Administration to establish an ad
hoc tripartite investigation team, independent of the Pension Board and OIOS,
to determine the real extent of the backlog and mismanagement in the Fund; and
calls for hardship damages to be paid to those who have had to endure
protracted delays in their pension payments. (A DM iSeek post dated 6 June
2016, states that the backlog has been 97 per cent eliminated as of 31 May 2016
and that the remaining 3 per cent is “in progress to be completed in June.” A
blog post specifically on the backlog is upcoming).
This recently initiated audit is not the first OIOS audit of the Fund in
recent years. In his open letter, the former Chief of Entitlements
holds that there is a lack of oversight of the Fund Secretariat and the backlog
crisis by both the Pension Board and OIOS and that a 2013 audit of Human Resources and IPAS “received
many red flags” which OIOS removed in order to “give the Fund a satisfactory
performance, despite the serious flaws from the beginning.“
We must really ask who AFICS/NY represents when
it seeks to undermine a serious OIOS audit with all these cavils. As retiree
representatives, they should be supporting an audit that seeks to understand
why this backlog has developed, how it can be quickly eliminated, and what has
been the impact on staff who are in the process of retiring.
The UN Ethics Office should be requested to
carry out an investigation into the efforts of AFICS/NY leadership to at the
very least weaken if not obstruct the OIOS audit. And it opens questions for AFICS members as to
exactly whose agenda the leadership is pursuing. It is certainly not speaking
for its members when it opposes any serious review of management practices in
the Fund.
______________________________________________
From:
Linda Saputelli
To: OIOS, cc
multiple addressees
Date: Wed, June
1, 2016 at 10:31PM
Subject: Re: Meeting request in assistance with audit planning
Subject: Re: Meeting request in assistance with audit planning
We would like to thank [the group] (redacted) for including
Warren Sach and me last week in your consultations related to your ad hoc audit
of pension delays by the UNJSPF. On reflecting on our meeting, however, we remain puzzled as to the need for
this exercise at this particular juncture and would hope that going forward it
will be fully coordinated with the Audit Committee of the Pension Board as to
scope, timing and content. For us, the timing alone seems
problematic. One concern is that an audit at this particular time will
require a gret deal of work and effort (e.g. interviews, data production, etc.)
on the part of Pension Fund staff at the very moment when they need to be
concentrating full time on operational priorities, and indeed may already be
demoralized by the criticism coming from the staff unions and others. Another is that because you do
not anticipate completion of your report until the end of the year, it would
have little impact.
Because of the foregoing and other concerns, we felt it
necessary to provide you with our views in writing.Timely pension payments do
not depend on the Pension Fund alone, as you well know. Before the Fund
can even begin to calculate a pension, there are a number of essential
preliminary steps that must be carried out in a timely manner by the future
pensioner and the separating organization. Many retirees believe that the
Fund is aware of their retirement date when in fact it is not and becomes
informed only when the separation documents begin to arrive. Statistics
on the time for organizations to complete dossiers show that this often takes
several months, yet those months during which files remain incomplete are being
counted by retirees waiting for their pensions in the gdelaysh.
We are further disturbed by reference to a gbacklogh when it
seems that there is no common understanding of the term. Terms such as
delays and backlogs have been increasingly tossed around without being properly defined or
communicated. Indeed, this may be as much the fault of the Pension Fund
itself as it is of other voices. It is clear that some pensioners may be
experiencing a wait of several months before receiving a pension. What we
do not know is why, but we do know that the reasons in every case are different
and individual and while some may be the Fundfs gfaulth, not all of them
are.
Further, it appears that there is no coordinated data on the numbers and reasons for the delays which is why much of it remains largely anecdotal. This has not prevented the staff unions from calling it mismanagement on the part of the UNJSPFfs CEO and petitioning the SG to terminate him. We feel that the noise from these sources has clouded the issue and served only to spread fear and anger. Early last summer, the Pension Fund informed staff nearing retirement that in August, 2015 it would be implementing a new IT system, IPAS, which would be run in tandem with the old one to ensure timely payment; it also advised them to set aside extra funds in the event the new system caused undue and unexpected delays. In fact, IPAS went off without a hitch for existing retirees who continued to receive their pensions in a timely manner and which is now processing payments at a much higher rate than in the past. For new retirees it appears that any delays in the early months of IPAS implementation were not solely the fault of IPAS. The UN Department of Management (DM) has been working closely with the Pension Fund for the past months to establish deadlines for payments, as DM is fully aware that its own role in providing the necessary separation documents is critical. In his address to the AFICS/NY Annual Assembly on 19 May, the Secretary-General confirmed that he expected all pending cases to be dealt with by the end of this month.
Further, it appears that there is no coordinated data on the numbers and reasons for the delays which is why much of it remains largely anecdotal. This has not prevented the staff unions from calling it mismanagement on the part of the UNJSPFfs CEO and petitioning the SG to terminate him. We feel that the noise from these sources has clouded the issue and served only to spread fear and anger. Early last summer, the Pension Fund informed staff nearing retirement that in August, 2015 it would be implementing a new IT system, IPAS, which would be run in tandem with the old one to ensure timely payment; it also advised them to set aside extra funds in the event the new system caused undue and unexpected delays. In fact, IPAS went off without a hitch for existing retirees who continued to receive their pensions in a timely manner and which is now processing payments at a much higher rate than in the past. For new retirees it appears that any delays in the early months of IPAS implementation were not solely the fault of IPAS. The UN Department of Management (DM) has been working closely with the Pension Fund for the past months to establish deadlines for payments, as DM is fully aware that its own role in providing the necessary separation documents is critical. In his address to the AFICS/NY Annual Assembly on 19 May, the Secretary-General confirmed that he expected all pending cases to be dealt with by the end of this month.
AFICS/NY attaches the greatest importance to the timely
payment of pensions. That is why we have been in close contact with the
Pension Fund management since the current problems and criticism first began to
appear last year. We have not refrained from candid and open criticism where it is due, but have strongly rejected any false
assertions whatever the source. We feel that this is a matter that must
be treated on the basis of facts and unassailable data alone and that the noise
and commotion that have been stirred up is out of order. Lastly, let me
say only that we could have had more fruitful consultations had we been privy
to the scope of your study in advance. When it is ready we would appreciate being apprised as it may bring to mind further comment. Please be assured that we remain available for future
discussion.
Kind regards,
Linda Saputelli and Warren
Sach
Linda Saputelli
President
AFICS/NY
DC1-580
Linda Saputelli and Warren
Sach
Linda Saputelli
President
AFICS/NY
DC1-580
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