Current Employees and Deferred Members
It is never too early to start thinking about retirement. To assist our members in this important journey, you can find more information below for your transition from employee to retiree. For more retirement planning questions, please contact our Retirement Specialist.
Benefits Calculator
The Benefits Calculator allows you to calculate estimated retirement benefits and the cost of purchasing additional time.
Benefits CalculatorRetirement Benefits & Planning
TERS Member Handbook
Please see the TERS Member Handbook for information regarding your retirement benefits.Retirement Planning Checklist
Please see the Retirement Planning Checklist for information that we provide during your retirement conference.TERS Overview
Please see the TERS Overview PDF for information that we present at our Retirement Planning Seminars and how to log into the Benefits Calculator.ÂMore Information
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Because members close to retirement need the most assistance and require the most staff time and resources when preparing to make the transition to retired life, the Retirement Department’s policy is to provide an estimate of retirement benefits to individuals who are within six months of retirement from their position. These requests are limited to once per calendar year and are only provided to those members who meet the six-month criteria.
Your estimate request must be written in writing using the Retirement Estimate Request Form and can be faxed, emailed, mailed, or sent by interoffice to the Retirement Department. Benefit estimates may take up to four weeks to complete.
If you are not within six months of retirement, you can use our online Benefits Calculator to get an approximate estimate of your retirement benefits. The online Benefits Calculator allows members to work up their own projections based on individual assumptions of salary increases and variable retirement dates.
If you are not comfortable using our online Benefits Calculator, you may contact the Retirement Department, and a staff member will walk you through the process or produce an estimate using the calculator for you. These estimates will be very close to but will not exactly match the final estimates.
Contact Information
Phone: (253) 502-8200Email: TERSretirement@tacoma.gov -
If you have ever worked for the State of Washington, other municipalities or agencies in Washington State, or the cities of Seattle or Spokane, you might be able to claim portability.
Portability is often misunderstood.
In short, claiming portability allows you to combine certain pension benefits between the Tacoma Employees’ Retirement System (TERS) and the other portable pension systems.
Portability does not mean that your contributions in the other pension system are transferred to TERS. You are only entitled to a pension from each respective system based on the number of years that you worked in each system; however, salary information is shared between the two pension systems. In addition, the number of years that you have worked in each system is combined to determine vesting rights.
If you withdrew your funds from a portable pension plan, you may be able to buy back your service time within a specified time period if you become a member of a portable plan such as TERS. Contact the portable system to inquire whether or not you can buy back time in their system, which could give you portability rights.
Please see our Portability Flyer for more information.
Additional Information can be found on the Washington State Department of Retirement Systems website.