The College of Applied Arts and Technology’s DBplus pension plan is welcoming more members of Canada’s legal community through an affinity agreement between the pension and the Canadian Bar Insurance Association.
According to a press release from the CAAT, employees from 42 smaller law firms joined the DBplus plan in the first six months of 2021. Through the agreement, established in July 2020, about 250 individual members of the legal community have joined the plan, says Dawn Marchand, president and chief executive officer of Lawyers Financial, a brand of the Canadian Bar Insurance Association representing the association’s financial solutions. While the new membership is mostly from smaller law firms, she says there’s been interest expressed by national firms as well.
Read: CAAT, Lawyers Financial partner to give Canadian legal community access to DBplus
“[Pension plans are] something law firms don’t have. Most are very small and they simply couldn’t do this on their own. They don’t have the infrastructure to pull one together. . . . [The CAAT DBplus plan] is a fantastic attraction and retention tool and members have been thrilled to be able to access sustainable and predictable retirement income.”
While the coronavirus pandemic made it more challenging to promote the program, Lawyers Financial turned to technology to overcome those hurdles, says Marchand. “[The pandemic] hampered our ability to get out and speak to people. A lot of these decisions are made around a boardroom table, but we pivoted and held several webinars on this topic that have been very well attended. We always get 100 people at least, sometimes 200.”