Update banking info at home
It’s one of many useful tools in the OPERS online account
By Donna Castiglione, Ohio Public Employees Retirement System
Sept. 10, 2019 – One of the requests retirees often ask us to help them with is updating their banking information. For security reasons we cannot update this information over the phone. It is also important you make changes well in advance of the end of the month if you want them effective for the next month.
The most efficient method is for you to update this information yourself. Just go to your online account and follow the prompts. We used to require our members to fill out a form and mail in a voided check, which is still available but no longer the only option.
Just click on “My Profile” in the toolbar and scroll to edit the “Bank Information” page. You’ll be prompted to enter your current account number, the new account number and the bank routing number. There’s a feature that looks up the routing number and displays the corresponding bank name, so you can double-check your entry.
Then, just confirm if it’s a checking or savings account and send us the info. If it is past the deadline to make changes for the next month the system will not allow you to make the change until after the next month’s benefits are posted. If you mail a form, we may not receive it in enough time to make the change for the next month.
If you have an HRA, changes made to your OPERS banking information are not changed with your HRA account. You make those changes through your Via Benefits account.
While you’re accessing your online account, you also can change items such as your address, correspondence preferences, phone number and email address, as well as passwords and privacy questions.
If you don’t already have an online account, just go to our website home page, click on the “Account Login” box at the top-right corner, and follow the prompts.
Donna Castiglione
Donna Castiglione is the assistant director of Member Services and has been with the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System for more than 13 years. She has extensive experience in customer service management in a variety of industries.
I live outside the USA, but maintain a bank account in Ohio.
I have been trying to get an answer for three years as to why my PERS benefits cannot be direct deposited in that account.
The first answer I received was that it is Ohio law, per ORC Chapter 145. It is not.
The second answer I received was that the PERS financial system is not ACH-compliant. That makes no sense. Making a direct deposit should not depend on the mailing address of the payee.
It costs PERS postage, envelopes and labor to mail every check and I suspect making a direct deposit would be less expensive. In addition, snail mail, including paper checks, can and does get misplaced, which costs additional labor and postage to replace it.
I encourage you to enter the 21st century and to change this irrational policy.
Thank you for “listening”.
I agree Eric. It’s unbelievable that still in 2021 (I see you wrote this in 2019) that OPERS can’t direct deposit directly into a foreign bank account. I get my Social Security payment wired directly to my foreign account and it’s converted by them into euros so I neither pay conversion fees from my foreign bank or any other fees. With a check I lose because of local bank check deposit charges and conversion fees into euros. In addition is the issue of checks being lost in transit. If SSA does this why can’t OPERS do the same? This is penalizing all expatriates. If OPERS is really concerned about members, as they should be, especially during the pandemic when every penny counts, they should have fixed this a long time ago.