Institutions for occupational retirement provision: financial institutions that manage collective retirement schemes for employers to provide retirement benefits to their employees (i.e. pension scheme members and beneficiaries).

(d) "retirement benefits" means benefits paid by reference to reaching, or the expectation of reaching, retirement or, where they are supplementary to those benefits and provided on an ancillary basis, in the form of payments on death, disability, or cessation of employment or in the form of support payments or services in case of sickness, indigence or death.

(d)‘retirement benefits’ means benefits paid by reference to reaching, or the expectation of reaching, retirement or, where they are supplementary to those benefits and provided on an ancillary basis, in the form of payments on death, disability, or cessation of employment or in the form of support payments or services in case of sickness, indigence or death.

(d) "retirement benefits" means benefits paid by reference to reaching, or the expectation of reaching, retirement or, where they are supplementary to those benefits and provided on an ancillary basis, in the form of payments on death, disability, or cessation of employment or in the form of support payments or services in case of sickness, indigence or death. In order to facilitate financial security in retirement, these benefits usually take the form of payments for life. They may, however, also be payments made for a temporary period or as a lump sum.

2. In accordance with the principle of subsidiarity and taking due account of the scale of pension benefits offered by the social-security regimes, Member States may provide that the option of longevity and disability cover, provision for surviving dependants and a guarantee of repayment of contributions as additional benefits be offered to members if employers and employees, or their respective representatives, so agree.

On the other hand, private pension plans generally encourage full rather than partial retirement, since retirement benefits are typically based on annual average earnings averaged over the last three or five years of employment, and full retirement may be required for receipt of any retirement benefits.