What you contribute

Your employer will calculate your contributions each pay period and deduct them directly from your pay. The amount you contribute is based on your earnings and the Plan’s contribution rates. The current rates are 6.9% up to the year’s maximum pensionable earnings (YMPE) and 9.2% above the YMPE.

Plus, you can feel secure knowing your employer supports your retirement security as HOOPP employers also fund the Plan. For every dollar that you contribute off your pay, your employer contributes $1.26.

The following section is intended to help you understand your contributions, and the amount you will receive in retirement. To assist in your understanding of this information, please refer to our glossary of pension-related terms.

If you work part time  

If you work less than full-time hours in your position, your contributions will be based on what you would have earned working full-time hours. Your contributions will then be adjusted according to the percentage of full-time hours you work.

To help you see what this would look like, we’ve provided an example of part-time contributions below.

Example of full-time vs part-time contributions

What you put in vs what you get out

The pension you receive over a span of 20+ years is much more than your total contributions. In fact, as we see in the graph below, most members receive their contributions back in the form of pension payments within three to four years into retirement. In addition to your lifetime pension, you may also benefit from features such as survivor benefits and inflation protection.** When these benefits are factored in, the value of your pension increases.

**HOOPP may provide inflation protection through a cost of living adjustment (COLA). Learn more about HOOPP's inflation protection.

How your pension is calculated

The monthly lifetime pension you will receive in retirement is determined using a formula that is based on your earnings and how much service you have built in the Plan.

To calculate your lifetime pension, we use:

• your average annualized earnings (measured over your best five consecutive years)
• years you contributed to the Plan
• the average YMPE

For each year of contributory service, you receive 1.5% of your average annualized earnings up to the average YMPE, plus 2% of your average annualized earnings above the average YMPE.

HOOPP pension formula*

*If you were eligible for HOOPP's past service benefit improvements effective January 1, 2018, April 1, 2021, January 1, 2023 and/or July 1, 2024, you may receive 1.75%, 1.9% or 2% of your average earnings up to the average YMPE (instead of 1.5%) for all or a portion of your contributory service before 2024. This means that eligible members will receive a larger lifetime pension for certain past service than they would have prior to the improvements. A corresponding adjustment to the bridge benefit applies for those who retire early. Learn more about the recent benefit improvements.

If you work part time

If you work part-time, we annualize your earnings to calculate your pension. That means we use the amount that you would have earned working full-time in your position when we determine your best five consecutive years of earnings.

Let's use Claire as an example:  

Early retirement and bridge benefits 

As a HOOPP member, you have the flexibility to start receiving your lifetime pension as early as age 55. An early retirement adjustment may apply based on your age and completed years of eligibility service. You'll also receive a temporary bridge benefit, along with your lifetime pension. Learn more about when you can retire.

Learn more about when you can retire.

Check how much your pension will be

With the Pension Estimator you can get a personalized estimate of what your future pension could look like at key milestone dates, and how it can change based on different factors and possibilities, such as:

• retiring early or later
• changing your future work schedule (e.g. from full-time to part-time or vice versa)
• any future salary increases.

Sign in or register for HOOPP Connect today!

Other benefits of being a HOOPP member

You get more than a lifetime pension. With HOOPP, you may also benefit from additional features that would be hard to find elsewhere, like survivor benefits for your loved ones, inflation protection and more. Plus, HOOPP is a multi-employer pension plan, which means you can continue to grow your pension at any of the more than 630 healthcare employers across Ontario that currently offer HOOPP.

Learn more about how your Plan features provide added benefits.