The Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario is marking its fourth annual Pension Awareness Day today by encouraging employees to understand their employer-sponsored retirement plan and ensure they’re on track to retire comfortably and on time.
This year’s campaign is focusing on the FSRA’s three keys to retirement security: employees’ understanding of workplace pension plans, plan member information and engagement and retirement planning.
“We’re encouraging people to learn more about their pensions and focusing on the value of workplace pension plans, how they work and how they fit into employees’ overall retirement savings goals,” says David Bartucci, head of pension plan operations and regulatory effectiveness at the FSRA.
Read: FSRA’s third annual Pension Awareness Day promoting importance of retirement planning
“For employees that don’t have a workplace pension plan, we’re encouraging those people to talk to their employer and ask them about [establishing] a plan.”
He notes the FSRA is also focusing on encouraging younger employees to start thinking about retirement and taking the necessary steps early in their careers.
“What we’ve seen is that people tend to find financial decisions to be complex and be a little bit intimidated, since retirement might seem really far away. Many people also have a conception of a pension plan as something that only really helps you if you’re going to work at the same company for your whole career, so we try and work through the dozens of organizations that are participating in Pension Awareness Day to try and encourage them to talk to their employees.”
According to data from the FSRA, workplace pension plan membership among Ontario-based workers grew by nearly 200,000 plan members in 2025, including more than 175,000 employees who joined a defined benefit plan (up six per cent from 2024) and more than 58,000 who joined a defined contribution plan (up nine per cent from the previous year).
However, a December 2024 survey by the regulator found widespread gaps in retirement readiness among Ontarians. Notably, eight in 10 employees said they haven’t fully developed a retirement plan, while 66 per cent said they haven’t calculated how much money they’ll need in retirement. Half (50 per cent) said they can’t recall the last time they spoke to someone about saving for retirement and the same percentage said they don’t read their annual pension statement.
With many employees not understanding the difference between DB and DC plans and, in some cases, how workplace plans differ from the Canada Pension Plan, Bartucci says the FSRA remains dedicated to supporting member education on Pension Awareness Day and throughout the year.
“There’s a blending together of these different plans in some people’s minds and that’s really why our focus is on encouraging people to spend that time learning about their pension plan.”
Read: FSRA promoting retirement planning with Pension Awareness Day