If you leave the company, your benefit capital from the 2nd pillar will be transferred directly to the pension fund of your next employer. If this is not possible because you are not starting a new job right away, you will need a vested benefits account instead. Since the introduction of new online forms, the Swisscanto Vested Benefits Foundation has offered a digital option for opening this type of account. And, as a completely new option, you can switch to e-mail communication from home for your vested benefits account as it is quick, convenient, environmentally friendly and absolutely secure. We introduced the option of an electronic signature for this purpose. This saves you having to print out and sign the necessary authorization and then take it to the nearest postbox.

What you should know about electronic signatures

Electronic signatures are now making handwritten signatures on documents obsolete in a number of areas. They save time and resources, reduce administrative time and also protect the environment, as fewer documents need to be printed, sent by post, scanned and archived. These advantages mean that they are being used in more and more areas of our lives. There are three different levels:

Simple electronic signature (SES): suitable for internal or informal documents such as supplier quotations, orders or documents

Advanced electronic signature (AES): suitable for documents with no legal form requirement such as rental contracts, purchase contracts or simple employment contracts

Qualified electronic signature (QES): suitable for documents with a legal form requirement such as consumer credit contracts, temporary employment contracts, auditor's reports or official documents

An AES is required to authorize e-mail communication relating to opening a vested benefits account. We use a solution provided by the certified Swiss company Skribble, which offers maximum security and confidentiality.

Why a vested benefits account?

Sometimes it is not possible to place pension assets with a new pension fund immediately after leaving the previous one. In this case they have to be "parked"; lawmakers have therefore provided for a vested benefits account for such cases. There are many reasons for this; read more in our article "The safe haven: the vested benefits account" or on the Swisscanto Vested Benefits Foundation website.