2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE THREE - Executive (§§ 1 — 9311) › Chapter 33 - Retirement of Government Personnel (§§ 761 — 830q) › § 764 - Employees Retirement System—Membership

(a) The membership of the System shall be constituted by every person who holds a regular position as a career, trust, temporary employee or with probationary personnel status in any executive department, agency, administration, board, commission, office, or instrumentality of the Executive Branch, by the Justices of the Peace, the regular employees and officials of the Judiciary Branch, and by all regular officials and employees of the municipalities, including the mayors. Temporary municipal employees shall not participate in the Retirement System.
(b) Regular and temporary employees of those public enterprises and municipalities who are participating employers of the system shall also be participating members of the system, subject to what is established in § 782 of this title.
(c) For purposes of membership in the system, the Office of the Citizens’ Investigating Official shall be deemed to be a public instrumentality, and the Puerto Rico Commonwealth Employees Association shall be deemed to be a public enterprise.
(d) Membership in the Retirement System shall be optional for the Governor of Puerto Rico, for all the Secretaries of Government, heads of public agencies and instrumentalities, the Governor’s aides, the members of commissions and boards appointed by the Governor, the members of the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico, for the employees and officials of the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico, the Office of Legislative Services and the office of the Superintendent of the Capitol, and the Comptroller of Puerto Rico. These officials may, at any time, request to be discharged from, or readmitted into the System. The period of services rendered to the Government while separated from the System, shall be credited as creditable service, provided said officials pay the individual and employer contributions, plus interest, that correspond to the period of separation, to the system.
(e) Admission into the Retirement System shall be optional for employees of departments, divisions, bureaus, offices, dependencies, public corporations, and instrumentalities of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico who work and reside outside the territorial limits of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. These employees may, while working outside of Puerto Rico, opt not to participate in the System or discontinue their participation. This decision shall be irrevocable. Once they return or begin to work within the territorial limits of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, they shall participate compulsorily in the Retirement System. Provided, That those employees who when exercising said option have their accumulated contributions in the System, may request the reimbursement thereof by wavering their vested rights in the System, if any.
(f) The age of an employee shall be no impediment to be admitted into the System as a participating member.
(g) The Administrator, with the approval of the Board, shall establish and put into effect the regulations necessary to establish the eligibility requirements, contributions, computation of pensions, annuities and death benefits, accreditation for services not credited and all other terms and conditions for the payment of retirement pensions and benefits for the participating members enrolled in the System.
(h) Any employee who on the day immediately preceding the date of application of §§ 761 et seq. of this title is a member of any pension plan or fund superseded by the System hereby created, shall maintain all vested rights under the pension plan or fund to which he/she belonged and any other vested rights under this System.
(i) Any person employed or to be employed pursuant to the provisions of §§ 711 et seq. of this title, shall be entitled to be admitted into the System as a participating member, provided said person has rendered services to the Government of Puerto Rico for a period to be established by the Administrator, with the approval of the Board, which shall be of not less than three (3) years.
All persons who are receiving a pension, benefit or have vested rights that entitle them to receive a deferred pension under §§ 761 et seq. of this title, administered by the Employees Retirement System of the Government of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, who were working at the Puerto Rico Telephone Authority and were participants of the Government Retirement System at the time of the sale of such company in 1999, shall have the right to obtain credit for the years in service required to be eligible for a pension for merit if such years have been already served or are being served in any government branch including the “Puerto Rico Telephone Company”, “Verizon” or “Claro”, or the right to have the pension recalculated or readjusted under the same terms.
In the event that any such employee had withdrawn all his/her contributions, he/she may return the same in order to avail him/herself of the retirement benefits that he/she was entitled under §§ 761 et seq. of this title, as of the date in which such contributions were withdrawn and pursuant to the provisions of this act.
The interest on account of un-credited years in service and returned contributions shall be payable at a special simple interest rate which shall not be greater than two and a half (2 1 / 2) annual percentage rate.
Such participants, who opt to avail themselves of the payment plan benefit granted by this act, may have not more than twenty (20) years of service left to be eligible for a pension for merit pursuant to §§ 761 et seq. of this title, which years in service may be credited according to the provisions of this act and shall have ten (10) credited years in services within the system.
To be eligible to opt for the payment plan at a two and a half (2 1 / 2) annual percentage rate accrued on the un-credited services or the return of withdrawn contributions, every participant must pay in full the amount due on principal plus interest on contributions owed after the PRTC Retirement Plan returns to the Retirement System any contributions held for each participant. To pay the amount due, the participant shall have a five (5)-year period or the period of time left to complete thirty (30) years in service to be entitled to a pension for merit, whichever period is greater, to be counted as of the date of approval of the payment plan by the Retirement System or the notice of the cost of un-credited services.
These participants shall not pay the employer’s contribution, since a large portion of the proceeds of the sale of Puerto Rico Telephone were allotted to the Employees Retirement System of the Government of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico for cover its actuarial deficit.
—May 15, 1951, No. 447, p. 1298, § 4; Apr. 16, 1952, No. 43, p. 100; May 11, 1955, No. 35, p. 122; June 12, 1957, No. 39, p. 90, § 1; July 19, 1960, No. 136, p. 390; June 20, 1972, No. 24, p. 421, § 4; June 15, 1981, No. 14, p. 101; June 1, 1982, No. 28, p. 61; May 21, 1992, No. 10, § 3; Dec. 28, 1995, No. 255, § 1; Feb. 13, 1996, No. 3, § 1; renumbered as § 1-105 and amended on Sept. 24, 1999, No. 305, § 7; May 9, 2004, No. 112, § 1; Aug. 9, 2008, No. 234, § 1; July 6, 2011, No. 116, § 1; Dec. 24, 2011, No. 279, § 1.
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