Woolworths
is to raise the age at which new members of its final-salary pension scheme can
retire from 60 years of age to 65.
Woolworths
said that raising the retirement age meant it could afford to keep its
final-salary pension when rivals were abandoning theirs.
The
retailer, which employs 30,000 staff, is just another in a long line of
employers changing pension previsions as longer life expectancy and lower
investment returns have made financing pension schemes too costly for companies.
Crises
in company pension schemes recently forced the Government to instigate new
guidelines to protect scheme members from losing their pensions benefits.