The great American melting pot occasionally means that information on government services native speakers of English take for granted aren't quite as clear to all.
With that in mind, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation has a program which allows speakers of 147 different languages to get more detailed information on their retirement needs – additionally helpful as the information itself is often complex enough on its own to participants.
The agency's Limited English Proficiency Program can assist plan participants by putting them in touch with the Foreign Languages Unit of PBGC's Benefits Administration and Payment Department.
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"After you work for that pension, if you want to know how it's calculated, nothing is better than to have it in your own language," said foreign languages coordinator Orfanny Vanegas. "PBGC's Customer Contact Center has people that speak Spanish. If the caller speaks Chinese, Italian, any other language, we have a translation service that can help them."
But contact with the agency often goes well beyond an informational call by a plan participant.
"If they need documents, forms, benefit letters – whatever is needed – we translate it," Vanegas said. "If it's in Spanish, we do it here. But we have a contract to translate to any other language. We translate any type of letter or application, in the language they are asking for."
The program has also been helpful in expediting payments and keeping the entire system rolling smoothly.
"If people don't understand what we ask for, they won't be able to send us the documentation that is needed to begin their benefit payments," she added. "That means the payments will be delayed, two, three, even four months as we go back and forth. That doesn't happen anymore because we have great services now. That's no excuse now for it to be delayed."
Recent surveys aimed at improving services have shown that very few of the participants who contact PBGC are doing so for assistance, and that the majority of those seeking language assistance do so in Spanish.
In an effort to keep the lines of communication open in a variety of tongues, the plan description now includes instructions on how to obtain language assistance in four different languages including variations of Portuguese, French, and Chinese.
PBGC also recently added to its website Spanish versions of 11 major pages or sections of the website. All of these pages are accessible via ¿Nuevo Usuario?, a Spanish version of the New to PBGC page.
Plan participants interested in obtaining translation services from PBGC or more information on PBGC's Limited English Proficiency Program should contact PBGC's Customer Contact Center by calling 1-800-400-7242.
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