UniFi

Sabir Bacus
Senior Benefit Consultant  

 

 

 

 

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UniFi’ed clients are happy clients

Employers operating a retirement fund for their staff have a statutory duty to provide monthly membership data to the administrators of the fund.  As stipulated by the regulator, this data must comprise specific information which has to be accurate.

GTC recently issued a communication on the latest changes to data requirements in terms of the FSCA Conduct Standard 1 of 2022, available here.  This Conduct Standard provides all of the detail needed for satisfying the principles embodied in section 13A of the Pension Funds Act.

For a number of years, GTC has provided employers with an electronic process – UniFi – which makes compliance with their statutory duties so much easier.  Some of the advantages of UniFi include:

• mapping out a benefit structure unique to each participating employer
• assimilating specific and relevant information
• reducing long data pipelines by directly integrating into primary administration systems and 
• providing time-saving efficiency.

The use of manually derived data (often recorded on spreadsheets) remains vulnerable to errors, most specifically human error.  These errors are usually only discovered after the data has been transmitted.

With spreadsheets, no immediate and automated reconciliation capability exists, where the data can be assessed and tested against pre-installed rules-based protocols before transmission.

 

The remedial action for errors is often time-consuming for both the employer and the administrator.  Financial mistakes are always difficult and usually costly to repair.

Further to this, the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) provisions regarding data protection and data protection during transit must be complied with.  The transmission of spreadsheets usually entails protection via encryptions and passwords.  If done manually, a secure line of transmission is required.  Transmitting the access codes is done separately from the transmission of the spreadsheets.  Overall, manual processing and transmission of data is laborious and is itself susceptible to errors, even if absolute care is taken each and every time.  

UniFi is GTC’s proprietary payroll integrator system that creates an electronic interface between a company’s payroll and the GTC administration platform, facilitating direct contribution reconciliation and meeting all of the POPIA security and transmission requirements. 

UniFi improves the efficiency of submissions and accuracy of monthly membership, payroll, and contribution data from the participating employer’s payroll administration system into GTC’s administration engine – Everest. 

This technology provides a great measure of comfort and confidence to the company director who is usually the person legally responsible for the provision of accurate membership data, as well as for the HR departments at the respective companies, all of whom rest easier knowing that the employee data being transferred is accurate, secure and complies with prescribed regulations.  

Online exception reports highlight any data inconsistencies which are then resolved immediately by the employer before final approval of the transmission, eliminating the risks associated with the manual manipulation and sending of data files and therefore the occurrence of errors that need to be amended after transmission.  Once the payroll interface file is received and verified, the employer automatically triggers the contribution collection process for authorisation and payment.

 

 

Because it makes work easier, more secure, and safer, GTC urges all employer retirement fund clients to adopt and utilise the electronic process provided by UniFi.