CPP calculator website

I'll give this a try in the next few days and will provide any useful feedback.

Since it's still under development, is it really necessary to gather names and email addresses at this time?

How is this any different than what is already on the CPP (MyAccount) site at Revenue Canada. I was able to access the estimated benefit from CPP for 60, 65 and 70 years of age for myself and my wife? The actual benefit received for myself was pretty close to the estimates, not taking into account Cost of Living increases that would have been upcoming.

rcmpvet wrote: ↑ How is this any different than what is already on the CPP (MyAccount) site at Revenue Canada. I was able to access the estimated benefit from CPP for 60, 65 and 70 years of age for my self and my wife? The actual benefit received for myself was pretty close to the estimates, not taking into account Cost of Living increases that would have been upcoming.

The estimates on the MSCA website "pretend that you're age 65" today, which has the same effect as projecting your current lifetime average earnings through to age 65. If your close to age 65 or if you intend to keep working until age 65, those estimates should be fairly accurate. Our calculator let's you insert various amounts into the future earnings years, and it will therefore give more accurate results and/or allow you the opportunity to see what the effect of different future earnings will be on your CPP pension. It also gives you all 11 yearly choices from age 60 thru 70, rather than just the 3 choices of ages 60, 65 and 70.

13inches wrote: ↑ I'll give this a try in the next few days and will provide any useful feedback.

Since it's still under development, is it really necessary to gather names and email addresses at this time?

Sorry about requiring an email address, but we're trying to make sure that real people get through to use it, and not to allow bots from blocking or disabling it.

From a digital marketing perspective you might get more use out of it by giving a little bit before asking for the user's e-mail. Get people started on it, give them a taste, but then request their e-mail if they want more detail. As it stands, it won't get a lot of traction if the user has to enter their e-mail right off the bat. Everyone knows that information is going onto an e-mail marketing list for Papyrus Planning.

Thanks OP for working on this venture
I look forward to using it and see figures
So far ive contributed 14 yrs to cpp and continue doing so. Hopefully cpp will be available to us when we retire. Ive got another 15-20 yrs to go still though.

apnayloags wrote: ↑ Hopefully cpp will be available to us when we retire. Ive got another 15-20 yrs to go still though.

Not to worry because unlike US social security your CPP is funded for the next 75 years.

https://www.cppib.com/en/our-performanc ... inability/

Played around with OP's site a few days ago. It's a little clunky to work with from a usability standpoint, however I do find the end results to be worthwhile.

I would suggest finding someone whose expertise is UI or graphic design to help polish the interface, and maybe streamline the inputs (ie: allow me to enter all the years that I earned to YMPE, or all my years of 0, at once, rather than year-by-year).

Back to the data farming point, you also have the function of uploading my CPP statement rather than manually inputting my earnings. What are you doing with these statements after you have them? I have concerns about that, as I'm sure others would too.

13inches wrote: ↑ Played around with OP's site a few days ago. It's a little clunky to work with from a usability standpoint, however I do find the end results to be worthwhile.

I would suggest finding someone whose expertise is UI or graphic design to help polish the interface, and maybe streamline the inputs (ie: allow me to enter all the years that I earned to YMPE, or all my years of 0, at once, rather than year-by-year).

Back to the data farming point, you also have the function of uploading my CPP statement rather than manually inputting my earnings. What are you doing with these statements after you have them? I have concerns about that, as I'm sure others would too.

Hi - Dave can speak to this better than I, but it's my understanding that none of the earnings information is retained on our system at all, after you leave the website.

13inches wrote: ↑ Played around with OP's site a few days ago. It's a little clunky to work with from a usability standpoint, however I do find the end results to be worthwhile.

I would suggest finding someone whose expertise is UI or graphic design to help polish the interface, and maybe streamline the inputs (ie: allow me to enter all the years that I earned to YMPE, or all my years of 0, at once, rather than year-by-year).

Back to the data farming point, you also have the function of uploading my CPP statement rather than manually inputting my earnings. What are you doing with these statements after you have them? I have concerns about that, as I'm sure others would too.

Further to my earlier reply, here is Dave's response as he is the web-designer:
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Making sure we do not use your personal information for any purpose other than calculate your benefits is a primary design of the calculator. That is why we do not retain or store information after it has been used by the calculator. That is why you cannot save multiple calculations and must rerun the calculation each time you try a different scenario. Some usability was sacrificed in order to be safe with your sensitive information.

The upload tool and the manual input use the same information for the calculation: full name, year of birth, month of birth and pensionable earnings. When a statement is uploaded, the calculator only pulls that information and nothing else.

While we are testing the calculator, which we are doing now before an official launch, we are monitoring the log files for up to 48 hours. After that, any information manually inputted or from the uploaded statement is gone.

Your comments about design are noted and we will be working on improving the design. Thank you for your helpful comments and for trying out the calculator.
********************************************************************

Dogger1953 wrote: ↑ Sorry about requiring an email address, but we're trying to make sure that real people get through to use it, and not to allow bots from blocking or disabling it.

I generally avoid sites that force me to give my email. I was going to try it out but this discouraged - letting you know since you're asking for feedback. There are other techniques to ensure it's a human not a bot.

If I plug some numbers into the calculator I get the following:

Age 60: $666.07
Age 65: $929.55
Age 70: $1319.96

The 65 and 70 numbers jive as the lift is 0.7% per month or 42 percent for 5 years.

My understanding is that the cut to take it early is 0.6% per month, or 36% for 5 years which works out to $594.91. So where does this $666.07 number come from?

13inches wrote: ↑ If I plug some numbers into the calculator I get the following:

Age 60: $666.07
Age 65: $929.55
Age 70: $1319.96

The 65 and 70 numbers jive as the lift is 0.7% per month or 42 percent for 5 years.

My understanding is that the cut to take it early is 0.6% per month, or 36% for 5 years which works out to $594.91. So where does this $666.07 number come from?

The calculator assumes you stop working now.
- zero earnings years from today until age 60 are accounted in all 3 scenarios,
- zero earnings years from age 60 until age 65 are accounted in the second and third scenarios,
- zero earnings years from age 65 until age 70 do not affect any scenario

The 65 vs. 70 numbers match as they have the same base to start with.

The 60 vs. 65 numbers do not match your assumption because the calculations are much more complex: different contributory periods, different length of drop-outs and so on. The only case in which your assumption would be correct for 60 vs. 65 is when one has enough maximum contribution years (earnings above YMPE), both at age 60 and 65, therefore the "base" is identical.

13inches wrote: ↑ My understanding is that the cut to take it early is 0.6% per month, or 36% for 5 years which works out to $594.91. So where does this $666.07 number come from?

Dogger can give the real answer, but while you're waiting, my hunch is it has to do with the dropout provisions. If you don't plan on having any earnings (or reduced earnings) from 60-65, you're accumulating more years with $0 pensionable earnings and zero contributions which will not be dropped out of the final CPP calculation. There's no such impact after age 65.

Thanks @Mike15 and @adrian2 for the responses. I suspect that you may both be right on this, and clearly there's much more to the calculations than I have knowledge of right now. I'm still learning a lot and both of your replies are helpful.

If it provides a little more clarity to this specific calculation, I entered all my values manually which were less than max contributions from 20-24, the max contributions from ages 25-50, and zero afterwards.

13inches wrote: ↑ Thanks @Mike15 and @adrian2 for the responses. I suspect that you may both be right on this, and clearly there's much more to the calculations than I have knowledge of right now. I'm still learning a lot and both of your replies are helpful.

If it provides a little more clarity to this specific calculation, I entered all my values manually which were less than max contributions from 20-24, the max contributions from ages 25-50, and zero afterwards.

In brief, your CPP "contributory period" starts when you turn 18 and ceases when you start collecting your pension or age 70. When you're looking at an age 60 CPP, your contributory period is 42 years (age 18 through 59) and when looking at age 65 CPP, it's 47 years (age 18 through age 64). The "general drop-out provision" means that 17% of your lowest-earning years get removed from the calculation of what your CPP will be.
https://www.taxtips.ca/seniors/cpprules.htm
So for age 60, they're taking the highest 35 of 42 years. For age 65, they're taking the highest 39 of 47 years.

Since you're reporting 26 years of max contribution plus 5 years of partial... scratch that, let's just keep the math simple and say you did 31 years of max contributions and no partial years. The age 60 calculation would be 31/35ths of CPP65 * 64%. The age 65 calculation would be 31/39ths of CPP65 * 100%. So waiting to collect eliminates the reduction, but also changes the overall calculation.

DaveTheDude wrote: ↑ Not to worry because unlike US social security your CPP is funded for the next 75 years.

https://www.cppib.com/en/our-performanc ... inability/

It's OAS people have to worry about

mech9t5 wrote: ↑ It's OAS people have to worry about

Why? This is a pay-as-you-go service, paid by general taxes. It's been around longer than CPP. If anything, you'd be worried about the GIS first, which is newer.

jeff1970 wrote: ↑ Why? This is a pay-as-you-go service, paid by general taxes. It's been around longer than CPP. If anything, you'd be worried about the GIS first, which is newer.

Because is it pay as you go who is gonna fund it if there are fewer workers? The govt can change it at any time.

Examples, Conservatives moved OAS to 67. They could easily reduce benefits or change the age again.