Employ't visa workers: You can't get your Provident Fund until you are 58 yrs. old

Times of India February 7, 2011. If you are Belgian, German or French, you can get your mandatory PF fund after you finish your contract. This is the 12% of your salary withheld that's matched 12% by the government.

If not, you must wait until you are 58 years old to get it. Good luck with that.

I like the sound of that bit!

Not by the Govt. By the employer.

Reason enough to move to India...it is only 6% in UK.

Different ball game. In UK, "National Insurance" is just way to make "Income Tax" look less. It's all tax, and over most of my working life it seemed that something like 9% was going in NI contributions.

So far, I got a ridiculously small amount of unemployment benefit ("job seaker's allowance") out of it. Oh, ok... there was the little matter of some major surgery, I have to admit...

You are quite right.... for 40% tax payer, it is more like 60 - 70 % in real terms; booz tax, petrol tax, VAT......

My co does match my 6% saving with 6% in the pension plan.

They've made these changes to try and strong-arm countries into signing totalization agreements with India. The U.S. and the U.K especially have been resisting--with millions of dollars worth of contributions by Indians on short-term visas disappearing into an abyss. Politics.

I had never thought about it before, despite the fact that I last worked for an expat-managed company in London. I imagine that my very-well paid foreign colleagues just regarded their National Insurance "Contributions" as tax.

Which is pretty much what native Brits do anyway. Whilst there is a nominal relationship between retirement pension and the minimum contributions that must have been paid, there is no personal fund of any kind. Nobody can say, "I paid in this amount: it is mine". Similarly, the benefits paid are according to the decision of the government of that time --- and may not even exist in the future.

Whether in UK or USA (I have worked in both for long term, 20+ years), there is no guarantee that there will be a state pension (UK) or social security (USA) that will be worth more than the contributions. We are at the mercy of the best of the worst politicians. I just hope that my house will be worth enough to retire on, like most Brits or sell everything and live in India relatively well. Very tough choices...

Why is it only 6%? Mine is 12%? Is there a scale? Anyone know?

I've written to my MP at home about it. It's a lot of money to just write off. Given they only made PF compulsory for foreigners in 2008 this looks suspiciously to me like it was done by design in order to use unfortunate souls like us as leverage against other countries.

Nick is right though, the NI contributions are different to the PF account. National Insurance is just that - insurance. If you don't claim against a personal insurance plan, you don't get the money back. If you need an expensive operation on the NHS, you can get one. It's not the same thing as personal retirement savings fund like a PF.

The other important distinction is that regardless of whether you are a foreign national or a Briton, the position on NI is the same. I can't 'withdraw' all of the NI contributions I've made over the years and, chances are, by the time I retire the state pension will be virtually worthless. An Indian working in the UK would be in exactly the same position as me. With the PF, Indians can still withdraw their contributions whenever they leave employment. What the Indian government are demanding from the UK government is actually special treatment for their citizens versus UK nationals and they are using inequitable treatment of UK citizens working in India as their point of leverage.

Anyway, my suspicion is that the US are the primary target and I know nothing about how their Social Security works, except for the fact that it is going to bankrupt them some time in the next 20 years or so.

... Employees' Provident Fund Organisation, India

It seems that workers from Belgium and Germany are ok

Belgium, Germany and France I think Nick. They already have existing Social Security Agreements with India.

Hmm.

I'll be very interested to see how this plays out. I applied for my Provident Fund money in early January, after leaving my job in late December.

Also, though I worked for all four years on an E-visa, I wonder if my newly obtained PIO status could possibly make a difference for me, a US citizen, in getting this cash.

It might very well make a difference to you in keeping a bank account (albeit non-resident) open.