Facts
On January 28, 1987, the engineering firm Y., Zurich, joined the Swiss Life collective foundation for occupational pensions of the Swiss Life Pension Fund and had its pension fund managed by the collective foundation. With the distribution plan dated May 16, 1994, unbound capital of the pension fund in the amount of CHF 120,000 was distributed to the six employees insured at the time. A., who had left the engineering firm and thus the pension fund on April 30, 1994, also belonged to the group of beneficiaries.
After the engineering firm had terminated the employment relationships with all employees, it terminated the affiliation agreement as of June 30, 1998. The pension fund had (as of September 15, 1998) free assets in the amount of CHF 243,411. Since the pension fund had not set up a joint management commission, the foundation board of the collective foundation decided on November 3, 1999 to carry out the total liquidation of the pension plan and a distribution plan for the free assets.
Considerations
The Federal Supreme Court considers that in the case of a partial liquidation, the pension assets must follow the previous beneficiaries. For such events, individual groups must not unjustifiably profit at the expense of others. The principle of good faith therefore requires that the pension assets follow the employees, and the principle of equality before the law prohibits allowing individual groups to profit from it at the expense of others.
The supervisory authority must ensure that the legal and statutory provisions are complied with and that the foundation's assets are used in accordance with its purpose. The free foundation assets must be distributed among the prospective beneficiaries according to a plan to be approved by the supervisory authority in the event of (total or partial) liquidation of a pension foundation. Within these limits, the competent bodies distribute the free foundation assets at their discretion.
The distribution plan considers the criteria of savings capital, contribution period, salary, and age as relevant for the distribution, weighting each at 25%. The Federal…