Pension Question

[StetsTerhune]

I've been working at the same company for 2.5 years and finally, a few days ago, I discovered that we have a pension plan (in addition to the 401K plan). After 3 years at the company  (in Feb.) I'll become vested and logging into the site I found it'll have a cash value of $6K or so by then.

Obviously I'm pretty pleased with this, found money is the best kind of money.  I don't know anything about this money though, and can't seem to find to find anything by googling (I don't even know enough to know what to search). The thought that anyone might have a pension for me has truly never occurred to me. It seems like taking the lump sum in cash is the clear choice, but is that taxable? Can I roll into an IRA (either a normal, after paying tax, or a Roth, before paying tax)?

Thanks for any info anyone has

[arebelspy]

It will very much depend on your company.  There's no generic answer that you can be sure is correct for you.

You will need to talk to someone at your company to get the details of it.

[Zaga]

arebelspy is right, you need to talk to your HR to be sure.  Most likely is you'll be able to roll the cash value of your pension to a rollover IRA when you leave your company, as long as you don't leave until after you're vested.  It's also an option to leave it there and hope that it's still there when you reach traditional retirement age, but with the number of pensions I hear about on the news that are under funded I personally would do whatever I could to get that money into my own control!

[grantmeaname]

Ohio's non-teacher public employee union has an 401k/IRA-like option with relatively low expenses. You may see if you could do something IRA-like with your pension if you're unable to take a disbursement and put it directly into a retirement account.

[RadicalPersonalFinance]

Call your HR coordinator and schedule an appointment to get details on the plan.  Also, read your benefit documents. It's likely that all of the details are in there in full detail but that you simply skipped reading them when you first became employed.