Retirees often miss out on all of the benefits that might be available to them because they don't know their pension is available or don't understand the consequences of failing to respond to plan communications. The Employee Benefits Security Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor is working to change that.

The first step in addressing any problem often is knowing that there is one. The agency has learned from its experience and from plan sponsors that the following red flags often are warnings or indicators of a problem with missing or nonresponsive participants:

• More than a small number of missing or nonresponsive participants.
• More than a small number of terminated vested participants who have reached normal retirement age but have not started receiving their pension benefits.
• Missing, inaccurate or incomplete contact information, census data or both.
• Absence of sound policies and procedures for handling mail returned marked "return to sender," "wrong address," "addressee unknown" or otherwise undeliverable email.

"A common characteristic of plans with low numbers of missing and nonresponsive participants is that staff are committed to making sure that plan records are complete and up to date and to proactively taking steps to ensure that participants and beneficiaries get the benefits they have earned in a timely fashion," according to the agency.