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Annual Report
Purpose: To identify members or beneficiaries of the Government Superannuation Fund (GSF) who have died.
BDM disclosure to GSF: BDM provides information from the Deaths Register covering the 12 weeks prior to the extraction date. The information includes full name at birth, full name at death, gender, birth date, death date, place of birth, and number of years lived in New Zealand (if not born in New Zealand).
Compliance: Compliant.
Technical Information
| Information matching provision | Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Act, 2021, s.112 |
| Year authorised | 2009 |
| Year commenced | 2009 |
| Programme type | Confirming eligibility |
| Unique identifiers | BDM registration number |
| Online transfers | Yes |
System description
Every four weeks BDM copy information from the Deaths Register covering the previous 12 weeks. The death extract includes full name at birth, full name at death, gender, birth date, death date, place of birth, and number of years lived in New Zealand (if not born in New Zealand).
The BDM data is matched against member records upon first name, middle name(s), last name, date of birth and gender. If these fields all match against more than one record, or if they only partially match then the records are manually reviewed and further information may be sought. A letter is sent to the member (their estate) to ensure the match is not in error before pensions are stopped.
Recent activity
Amendments to the Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Act 1995, effective from 24 January 2009, changed the status of this programme to an authorised information matching programme. The programme was previously operating under a memorandum of understanding.
| Period covered: | 2016/17 | 2017/18 | 2018/19 | 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 |
| Records received for matching | 32,656 | 30,653 | 33,657 | 33,802 | 33,339 | 36,194 | 38,608 |
| Possible matches identified | 11,094 | 7,820 | 8,802 | 8,985 | 8,447 | 9,317 | 9.854 |
| Letters sent | 742 | 435 | 748 | 778 | 695 | 922 | 891 |
| Challenges | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Successful challenges | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The utility of this provision was assessed in a report Superannuation and NHI Matches (Jan 2015) and subsequently in . Department of Internal Affairs, Government Super Fund, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health, National Provident Fund and New Zealand Transport Agency information matching (July 2020).
