Companies and sector organisations are reluctant to put extra money into pension funds if there is a risk pay-outs need to be cut, the Financieele Dagblad reports on Monday.

The paper bases its claim on research into the 100 worst-performing pension funds in the country. In just seven cases have employers so far been willing to put in top-up funds to head off the risk of cuts, despite many being required to do so in their statutes
The paper says the reluctance of companies to bail out their funds is part of the trend towards giving workers more responsibility for their own pensions. The new pension system, which the government hopes to introduce, moves to a fixed contribution system in which eventual pay-outs will depend on stock exchange movements.

Cuts in 2013
Later today, the pension federation is due to publish a list of all the pension funds which will have to cut pay-outs from April 2013, unless the economy improves. At the beginning of this year, the Dutch central bank said the list could include up to 125 funds covering millions of workers.
Engineering group Boskalis has put money into its pension fund and a cut of 7% will no longer be necessary, the FD says. Motoring organisation ABWB has also injected extra cash but will still have to reduce pensions by some 1.1%.
The state-owned Holland Casino group, where a cut of between 4% and 6% looms for pensioners, is not topping up the fund. ‘To bring our assets back to the required level, the top up would have to be so big as to damage the company,’ a spokesman told the paper.