21 February 2025
The Federal Court of Australia civil penalty case against AustralianSuper in relation to a contravention of our obligations to combine multiple accounts held by members has been concluded.
The Fund identified that processes to detect and combine multiple accounts held by a member did not meet our obligations under superannuation laws and reported this issue to ASIC and APRA in December 2021.
We then informed impacted members, completed a comprehensive remediation program to compensate them, and cooperated at all stages with the regulators.
‘We found this mistake, we reported it, we apologised to impacted members, we compensated them, and we’ve improved our processes to prevent this happening again,’ AustralianSuper Chief Executive Paul Schroder said.
‘Multiple member accounts are a problem across our industry and for several years our process wasn’t comprehensive enough to meet our obligations to members. We've fixed that now and we continue to review and improve our services, so we provide members with the support and guidance they expect and deserve.’
ASIC and AustralianSuper jointly submitted to the Court that penalties totalling $27 million would be appropriate. The Court has ordered AustralianSuper to pay that penalty.
A provision was made for an expected penalty in the 2023/24 financial year accounts, and member administration fees (which remain some of the lowest in the industry1) have not been increased to cover it.
AustralianSuper has more than 3.5 million members and last financial year added $26.7 billion in net investment earnings to their retirement savings.
For media enquiries, please contact
Sam Prenesti
M: +61 438 012 162
E: sprenesti@australiansuper.com
Notes
1 Source: Zenith CW Pty Ltd (Chant West) (ABN 20 639 121 403). Chant West Super Fund Fee Survey June 2024. Survey compares administration fees and costs for MySuper products for a $50,000 balance. Other fees and costs apply. Fees may change in the future which may affect the outcome of this comparison.
About AustralianSuper
AustralianSuper manages more than $365 billion in members’ retirement savings on behalf of more than 3.5 million members from more than 472,000 businesses (as at 31 December 2024).
This media release may include general financial advice which doesn’t take into account your personal objectives, financial situation or needs. Before making a decision consider if the information is right for you and read the relevant Product Disclosure Statement, available at australiansuper.com/pds. A Target Market Determination (TMD) is a document that outlines the target market a product has been designed for. Find the TMDs at australiansuper.com/tmd.
AustralianSuper Pty Ltd ABN 94 006 457 987, AFSL 233788, Trustee of AustralianSuper ABN 65 714 394 898.