2016 Thrift Savings 

Plan Education Efforts 

Federal Retirement Thrift 

Investment Board 
IntroducƟon 3

Social Media 4

ParƟcipant CommunicaƟons 5

Financial Literacy and EducaƟon Commission 6

Annual Statement Enhancements 6

Agency Representative and Employee Trainings 7

Contents 
We are pleased to provide this summary of our educaƟon efforts in 2016 in response to the following

requirement contained in the ThriŌ Savings Plan (TSP) Open ElecƟons Act of 2004:   

The Board shall annually report to the CommiƩee on Governmental Affairs of the Senate and the 

CommiƩee on Government Reform in the House of RepresentaƟves on its ThriŌ Savings Plan 

educaƟon efforts on behalf of plan parƟcipants. Pub. L. 108 ‐469, §2, 118 Stat. 3891, 3892 

In 2016, the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board (FRTIB) engaged and educated participants 

using social media, YouTube videos, one-to-one communications, continued active involvement with

the Financial Literacy Education Commission, enhanced annual statements, and training for agency 

TSP representatives and employees.

We are committed to delivering compelling messaging that encourages participants to save for

retirement; to educating, communicating, and interacting with participants to help them make smart

choices; and to creating innovative products and programs to assist participants in achieving their

retirement goals. In an effort to recognize outstanding efforts in promoting the TSP , we honored the

first recipient of the TSP Shining Star Award in 2016.

Introduction 

Thrift Savings Plan Education Efforts 3
Social Media

The TSP released a new video during 2016, "Three 

Ways to Add $100,000 to Your TSP Account." Aimed 

at uniformed services members, it shows how small 

steps, like cutting back your cable or cell phone, can 

help your savings grow over time. It already has 

over 150,000 views, the second most among all our 

videos.

YouTube Videos 

Thrift Savings Plan Education Efforts 4

The TSP joined Facebook on September 5, 2016, and 

within two days of launch we had more than 38,000 fans.

That number continued to grow through December to

68,487. Our goal is to deliver important TSP information in 

an engaging and responsive way. We post general plan 

information, reminders, videos, and other resources. Our 

post about the 2017 IRS contribution limits reached over 

23,000 people and garnered 94 "likes." We also post 

content that will help us interact with our participants. For 

example, we asked participants about their dream 

retirement. On that post we received 54 comments from 

participants talking about what they’re looking forward to in 

retirement and posting photos of their ideal retirement 

locations. 

Facebook
Thrift Savings Plan Education Efforts

Participant Communications 

We also occasionally used mass emails to communicate with participants and beneficiaries. The first email, sent on May 

27, 2016, addressed the subject "Scheduled Outages: ThriftLine and My Account." It was sent to 1,641,543 addresses 

and had 436,485 unique opens.

The second email, addressed the subject "TSP is on Facebook" and was sent on September 7-8, 2016. It was sent to 

2,210,891 addresses and had 602,760 unique opens.

5

Email Notices

Our educaƟonal efforts also include one‐to‐one contact. We offer parƟcipants various ways to submit inquiries to the

TSP including wriƩen correspondence, secure e‐messaging, and telephone calls.  We also receive questions via 

Twitter and Facebook; assuming it is not a question related to an individual participant's information, we answer 

them whenever possible .

Telephone Calls  

Answered

2,274,276

Secure  

E‐messages

59,264

WriƩen  

Correspondence

39,971

In 2016 we began a new informational distribution service to members of the Employee Thrift Advisory Council (ETAC), a 

statutorily created advisory committee comprising representatives of employee organizations, unions, and the 

uniformed services. Every three months, ETAC members receive the Quarterly Information Packet, which contains 

timely, accurate, actionable TSP material that can be included in their publications and on their websites. A typical 

packet includes an article about a TSP topic, a frequently asked question and answer, an infographic, and a featured 

video. This allows us to continue to disseminate TSP information by using these additional channels.

Quarterly Information Packet
Financial Literacy and Education Commission 

(FLEC)

As part of a Financial Literacy and Education Commission pilot program to encourage federal agencies to echo the 

TSP in their messaging to their own employees, we launched the TSP Shining Star Award. In 2016, the Department of 

Labor (DOL) was the first recipient of the award. After watching the Take Five for your Future video, DOL human 

resource officers checked to see how many of their emplolyees were contributing less than what was necessary to 

get the full match from the agency, 5%, to their TSP accounts. The DOL sent a carfeully crafted email to its 4000 

employees who were not receiving the full match. Six-weeks later, 4.2% of those receiving the email had increased 

their contributions to at least 5%. By contrast, only 1.9% of those who had not received the email took that 

important step. Employees who received the email and raised his/her contribution rate increased annual savings by 

$3000. If maintained over 20 years, this increase would translate into approximately $115,000 more in the 

employee's TSP account. 

Annual Statement Enhancements 

We made minor changes to the 2016 annual statements to make them more comprehensive and easier to read. 

We also added the TSP’s Facebook information.

As we have before, we targeted certain groups by including special leaflets in their annual statements. One leaflet 

targeted FERS participants of any age who had never contributed to their TSP accounts; it detailed how matching 

works and the benefits of not leaving money on the table. Another went to younger uniformed services members 

and explained the power of compounding over time. A third leaflet informed new employees that they had the 

option to transfer other eligible plans into the TSP.

Thrift Savings Plan Education Efforts 6
By law (5 U.S.C. § 8350) the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is required to operate a training program for

reƟrement counselors in employing agencies. This requirement ensures that employees are able to obtain current

informaƟon and personal service in response to their reƟrement‐related quesƟons. Since 1987, we have worked with

OPM to sustain a network of TSP agency representaƟves as part of this program. The TSP agency representaƟves

receive training and stay current by aƩending specialized TSP training sessions. In 2016, 118 TSP agency

representaƟves aƩended a total of 14 training sessions led by the TSP training staff. We also hosted four quarterly

meeƟngs with 159 agency representaƟves receiving TSP updates for their HR offices.  

Agency Representative/Employee Trainings 

We also provide free training sessions to federal 

employees and uniformed services members. 

A total of 27,298 employees aƩended TSP training

sessions, either in person or by webinar. Of these, 

Thrift Savings Plan Education Efforts 7

We will conƟnue joint efforts such as this one to reach more employees in the future.

5,398 attended one of the the 87 sessions of the 

"TSP A-Z" course; 4,541 attended one of the 94 

sessions of the "Early to Mid-career" course; 13,774 

attended one of the 209 sessions of the "Preseparation" course. There were 3,585 people 

logged into our webinar sessions, which were

online versions of these courses.

We also increased our exposure with TSP exhibits at 

conferences and financial benefits fairs for civilian 

employees and members of the uniformed services. In 2016, we participated in 56 such events, enabling our staff 

members to teach 15,509 aƩendees.

We also partnered with the SecuriƟes Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) 

to conduct joint trainings for Federal Executive Boards (FEB) in California, Georgia, Hawaii, Louisiana, Missouri, and 

Pennsylvania. The 209 FEB sessions reached 2,309 federal employees.