Employer contributions

If you change your employer in most instances you can request, they pay your super into your Vision Super account. Simply fill in the Choice of Fund form and hand it in to your payroll officer.

If you have to go with your employers default super fund you may be able to keep your insurance benefits with us because your insurance cover with Vision Super doesn’t necessarily cease when you change employers (provided that you satisfy the terms and conditions contained within the relevant insurance policy).

We’d encourage you to talk to us before you engage a lawyer. Vision Super pays more than 85% of insurance claims, so the likelihood is your claim will be paid if you work with us directly, and you’ll end up with more of your money. Many lawyers advertise that they’ll work for you on a ‘no win, no fee’ basis, but if your claim is approved, they may take a large chunk of your payout – it can be around 30% of an entitlement. Our insurance team is here to help you through every step of the claims process, including all the paperwork, without having to get a lawyer involved and potentially losing money you need to pay for medical treatment or maintain your lifestyle.

Call us on 1300 300 820 and we will answer any questions and send you the required information.

Yes, you can cancel your cover at any time. Any cancellation or reduction of cover will take effect from the date we receive your request or the date you specified in your request (as long as it’s after the date we receive it). If you are replacing your existing cover with an alternative cover, before cancelling we recommend that you have your replacement cover in place first. To talk to us about cancelling a policy, please call us on 1300 300 820.

If you are thinking about changing your insurance please consider seeking financial advice before making any changes to make sure it is right for you and your needs and circumstances.

You may be able to get cover if you have a pre-existing medical condition. You will just need to apply to remove the pre-existing condition exclusion when you join by filling in a Personal Statement. Our Insurer will review your application taking into consideration any pre-existing conditions and general health and advise if your request has been accepted.

If your application is unsuccessful,  there will be a two-year Pre-Existing Condition (PEC) exclusion on Death and TPD cover and Income Protection cover. This means that no benefit will be paid if you are totally and permanently disabled, terminally ill or die as a direct or indirect result of a pre-existing medical condition in the first two years of your insurance cover.

You can have multiple income protection policies, and there are legitimate reasons why people choose more than one product.

However, some income protection policies prevent claimants from receiving more than a certain percentage of their gross salary while off work. What that means is you could have three income protection policies that all offer payments equalling 75 per cent of your gross salary, but you wouldn’t be able to claim the full amount from all three. You would typically be limited to a combined maximum of 75 per cent across the policies.

We’re required to have Target Market Determinations under the Treasury Laws Amendment (Design and Distribution Obligations and Product Intervention Powers) Act 2019.

This is to make sure we’re keeping members at the centre of our approach to the design and distribution of our financial products.

This legislation requires financial services product issuers to design products that are appropriate for the consumers in the target market and consistent with their objectives, financial situation, and needs.

A Target Market Determination is a document which describes who a product is appropriate for (target market), and any conditions around how the product can be distributed to customers.

It also describes the events or circumstances where we may need to review the Target Market Determination for a financial product.

Cash investment options are generally invested in money market securities, such as bank term deposits and negotiable certificates of deposit.

If you are risk averse or have a short timeframe, then a Cash option that typically provides stable, low risk returns may be suitable for you. This type of investment option can protect the nominal value of your superannuation, but the returns will often be low compared with other investment options over the medium to longer term.

Cash can be a safe haven in times of economic uncertainty, and occasionally you may wish to aim to preserve capital by allocating some of your super to cash.

We recommend that you obtain financial advice before making any decisions about investing in our Cash option.

To book an appointment with a Vision Super financial planner, either call us or complete our online appointment form:

Go to the form to book an appointment online >

Call our Contact Centre on 1300 300 820 (Monday to Friday 8:30am to 6pm).

Advice fees may apply, which will be discussed with you before any work is undertaken.

We recommend that you obtain financial advice before making any decisions about switching between investment options. To book an appointment with a Vision Super financial planner, either call us or complete our online appointment form:

Go to the form to book an appointment online >

Call our Contact Centre on 1300 300 820 (Monday to Friday 8:30am to 6pm).

Advice fees may apply, which will be discussed with you before any work is undertaken. For full details on advice costs, please refer to the  Vision Super Fees and Costs guide.

Decisions about which investment option is most appropriate for you should be based on a considered assessment of your risk profile. Occasionally you may wish to review your risk profile. For example, when you are first starting out in the workforce or when you are a few years away from retirement and/or going into retirement.

Frequent switching between investment options and trying to second-guess the market can be risky, particularly for high-risk investment options designed to be held in the long-term (6 or more years). You should switch only after a thorough review of your long-term investment strategy.

Implementing Switches

You can switch investment options for some, or all, of your account balance, future contributions, or both. You can also nominate which investment option you would like your withdrawals to be made from. Vision Super does not charge members for switching their investment options.

You can switch between investment options by logging into our website, or the Vision Super app, or by sending us a completed Investment choice form. You can also call us, on 1300 300 820 (Monday to Friday 8:30am to 6pm).

Investment switches are processed based on the unit prices of the relevant investment options declared on the next business day after we receive your switching request, unless there is a delay with processing due to abnormal market conditions or system failure.

Growth assets such as Australian shares are higher risk and typically offer a higher potential return compared to defensive assets such as cash. They aim to grow the capital that’s invested and provide some income. Defensive assets are lower-risk investments which aim to protect the capital invested while providing a high proportion of return as income.

The classification of assets into either growth or defensive provides a rough indication of the risk of an asset. However, it has shortcomings as it:

• > Only has two classifications (growth and defensive).
• > The classification does not capture diversification, which can have a larger impact on reducing the overall portfolio risk when assets are combined.
• > There is not consistency in how super funds use growth and defensive classifications.

Our primary objective is to maximise our members’ investment returns so that our members have more for their retirement. Vision Super’s approach to responsible investing is actioned through our proxy voting, collaborative initiatives, company engagement, carbon budget, security exclusions and through policy advocacy work through our proxy research advisers and on occasions directly when required.

One of the means by which we try to achieve this objective is to instruct our underlying investment managers to incorporate Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) considerations into their investment decision-making processes. We believe that this approach will help support long-term investment performance and enhance risk management.

The way we factor ESG issues into our investment decisions is set out in our Responsible Investment Policy.

We are a signatory and member of a range of organisations that promote responsible investing in the superannuation industry, including the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) and the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors (ACSI). We are also a signatory to the Global Investor Statement to Governments on the Climate Crisis and we are a lead and support investor to the Climate Action 100+ initiative. This is an investor-led initiative aiming to ensure the world’s largest corporate greenhouse gas emitters take appropriate action in relation to climate change.

These items reflect short-term liabilities such as overdrafts and margins that need to be posted to collateral accounts for strategies using exchange traded derivatives following certain market moves.

Our Australian equities managers invest in portfolios of predominantly Australian companies. This may well include companies that are property or infrastructure businesses, which are classified as Listed Property or Listed Infrastructure in the portfolio holdings reporting. Similarly, the cash holdings within these portfolios will be reported as Cash.

The rules the government has put in place for super funds are designed to provide greater transparency about underlying investments and place increased focus on trustees ensuring their only consideration, when investing, is to act in the best financial interests of our members.

We take the environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance of companies into account because we believe that companies that perform well on these factors are more likely to have better long-term performance. More detail on the way we factor responsible investment considerations into our decision-making, including our overarching investment beliefs and divestments framework, is set out in our Responsible Investment Policy.

However, if we excluded every company that someone ‘might not like’ from our portfolio, we would have an increasingly narrow field of possible investments. People have a wide range of views on companies they believe we shouldn’t invest in – this list would cover everything from dairy companies, to fashion brands, medical research, gaming and banks.

Restricting our investments like this would almost certainly reduce diversification and impact on portfolio performance over the longer term – which runs counter to our core obligation to act in the best financial interests of our members.

Vision Super excludes companies that are identified by our ESG data service provider as having any involvement in the production of tobacco. Alternative smoking products (including vaping) companies are also excluded.

Our decision to divest from tobacco producers also reflects the risk that the returns from these companies will be adversely impacted by litigation and/or regulation.

Links to the list of equity securities that we consider to be excluded investments as well as the related definitions are provided below:

• Excluded securities list
• Excluded securities list definitions

A link to the Responsible Investment policy is provided below:

• Responsible Investment policy

Controversial weapons are weapons that can have a severe impact on civilians and are generally banned under international treaties. Land mines, cluster bombs and nuclear weapons are deemed to be particularly controversial because of their indiscriminate impacts on civilians and the disproportionate harm they cause – in the case of land mines, for many years after a conflict has ended. Despite being widely considered to be controversial and often prohibited by international treaties, these weapons are still produced in some parts of the world.

Based on information provided by our ESG data service provider, Vision Super excludes listed equity investments that generate:

• 5% or more of revenue from critical components for nuclear weapons.
• Any revenue from controversial weapons (ex-nuclear) as defined by MSCI.

Links to the list of equity securities that we consider to be excluded investments as well as the related definitions are provided below:

• Excluded securities list
• Excluded securities list definitions

A link to the Responsible Investment policy is provided below:

• Responsible Investment policy

Our exposure to fossil fuels is implemented through carbon intensity restrictions for our listed equity portfolios. The listed equity asset classes are managed with an approach that aims to provide meaningfully less carbon-intensive exposure versus the respective benchmarks (calculated on MSCI Analytics on scope 1 and 2 carbon intensity levels). Our listed equity carbon intensity restrictions apply to our direct equity investments across our options. From time to time, it will be necessary for our investment managers to transition the portfolios they manage for the agreed Excluded Securities List (ESL), for example where a portfolio has been transferred into Vision Super as part of a merger, or where there is a material change in our approach to exclusions.

For further information please refer to our Carbon Budget page

Centrelink needs to know some details so they can calculate payments such as the age pension. We provide this information directly to Centrelink electronically, on your behalf, every February and August. You can request a Centrelink schedule from Vision Super at any time.

No. Once you have opened an account you cannot make any additional contributions. However, you can close your existing account and open a new account, combining any additional contributions with your existing balance.

Important to know: Government changes to deeming rules could affect you if you choose to close your current account and open a new one. To find out whether your entitlements – including the age pension – could be reduced, we recommend seeking financial advice first.

Your regular pension income payments will be paid directly to a personal or joint bank account nominated by you in your application form. You can choose to receive payments twice monthly, monthly, bimonthly, quarterly, four-monthly, six-monthly or annually.

You have access to make lump sum withdrawals (over and above your pension (income)) payments from a retirement pension however, with a transition to retirement pension lump sum withdrawals are limited and you can only commute your pension by transferring your account balance into an accumulation product.

You need to have met preservation age and have a minimum investment amount of $10,000. Other eligibility conditions apply. Refer to the Vision Super Income Streams PDS for further details.

Eligibility for the government age pension depends on your age, residency status, and the income and assets tests, plus the value of your assets. If you are eligible, for all or part of the government age pension, then combining it with your Vision Super pension can work well. You can use the age pension to meet basic living costs and spending money can come from your Vision Super pension.

Stapling commences on 1 November 2021. From 1 November 2021, employers will need to take new steps to determine the correct super fund for new employees.

Where the ATO identifies multiple funds that may be stapled to an employee, tiebreaker rules will apply:

1. The most recent fund identified by the ATO will be the employee’s stapled fund for the selected period (from the start of the previous financial year until the day when the ATO applies tiebreaker requirements).
2. If 1. doesn’t apply, it will be the fund that received the most recent contribution over the selected period.
3. If 1. and 2. don’t apply, it will be the fund that held the largest balance at the end of the previous financial year.
4. If none of the above applies, the ATO will consider factors like when an employee joined a fund and other relevant information to identify the stapled fund.
5. Employees will also be able to see details of their stapled super fund in their MyGov account.

If you are doing this for a single member and not using the ATO’s bulk upload service, the ATO expects results to be available within minutes.

If the ATO provides a stapled super fund response to an employer, the ATO will contact the employee and advise them of the request.

Employees will receive an SMS if they have a valid mobile number in the ATO records and/or a letter (through myGov or paper) advising who has requested the information and more details on the options available to the employee.

Yes, it applies to all employers.

Existing employees aren’t affected by these changes. You must continue to make their compulsory superannuation guarantee (SG) payments into the same super fund account you do today.

We’re required to have Target Market Determinations under the Treasury Laws Amendment (Design and Distribution Obligations and Product Intervention Powers) Act 2019.

This is to make sure we’re keeping members at the centre of our approach to the design and distribution of our financial products.

This legislation requires financial services product issuers to design products that are appropriate for the consumers in the target market and consistent with their objectives, financial situation, and needs.

A Target Market Determination is a document which describes who a product is appropriate for (target market), and any conditions around how the product can be distributed to customers.

It also describes the events or circumstances where we may need to review the Target Market Determination for a financial product.

It depends how your details have been changed. The most common request is changing a surname due to marriage, which you can do with a certified copy of your marriage certificate, and a Vision Super “Change of Personal Details form” found here: view form

If you have changed your name another way, we recommend you contact us first on 1300 300 820 so we can outline what documents we need to change your details without issue.

If you want to change your address, you can do this by logging onto the secure member portal online, or calling our Member Services team on 1300 300 820.

You can check your balance 24/7 via Vision Online, our secure member secure site, or via the Vision Super app for mobile devices. You can also contact our Member Services on 1300 300 820 or by emailing us on [email protected]

Here’s how it works. You may be able to receive a tax-free contribution from the Government when you make a non-concessional (after-tax) contribution to your super account.  The maximum entitlement that can be received is $500 where your total income is $45,400 or less in the 2024/25 year. This reduces on a sliding scale and cuts out if your total income is above $60,400 in the 2024/25 year.

ATO source

If you’re contributing by BPAY, it can take Vision Super up to two business days to receive your contribution, then up to three business days to process, although most are done the same day they are received. This will depend upon your financial institution’s processing times.

If you’re contributing by cheque, you will need to allow enough time for your chosen postage method to reach us. Once it has arrived, it can take up to five working days to process.

We can also process contributions by EFT, however, this may take up to three business days.