How can I check how much money I have in my savings pot?

The long answer

Thank you for your email asking how much you have got in your savings pot.

You will only have a savings pot if you are a member of a provident or pension fund, which I will just call a fund. 

Before 1 September 2024, whatever you had already saved in your fund would be in your “vested pot”. After 1 September 2024, your vested pot would make a one-off transfer to your savings pot of 10% of whatever you had saved, but not more than R30,000. This is because there would be no money in your savings pot before 1 September. 

After 10% of what you had already saved by 31 August 2024 had been transferred from your vested pot to your savings pot, you could withdraw money from your savings pot once every tax year. You cannot withdraw less than R2,000 from your savings pot.

So, if you had saved R200,000 in your fund before 1 September 2024, 10% or R20,000 would be transferred from your vested pot to your savings pot.

But if you had less than R20,000 in your vested pot, 10% would be less than the minimum R2,000 withdrawal, so nothing would have been transferred to the savings pot.

After 1 September 2024, the money that you contribute to your fund each month will be split two-ways: One third to your savings pot and two thirds to your retirement pot. 

As said above, you can make one withdrawal a year from your savings pot, but you cannot access your retirement pot until you retire, even if you lose your job or resign.   

The Association for Savings and Investment South Africa (ASISA) explains that you will only be able to apply for a withdrawal when your fund tells you that it has seeded your savings pot and is ready to accept your application.

You will also pay tax on the money you withdraw from the savings pot and SARS has to issue a tax directive before you can access the money from your savings pot. 

You could ask the administrator of your fund to check and tell you how much you have in your savings pot.

If you were 55 years old or older on 1 March 2021, and are a member of a fund, you would be excluded from the two-pot system. In that case, your retirement savings would be the same as they were a year ago, with no separate savings pot. If you wanted to be part of the two-pot system and withdraw from the savings pot, you would have to ask your fund administrator how you could be part of it.

Wishing you the best,
Athalie