Assagenti News

Shipagents' pension Fund: Fama

It was the early Eighties, and the Board of Directors of Federagenti (the Federation of Agents) was in search of new options for providing support to the whole category. As a result, a group of pioneers felt that creating a welfare fund to assist its Members would provide an excellent means of support.
The result, following a brief period of incubation, saw the F.a.m.a. –Maritime and Air Agents Fund, established in Genoa on 31 January 1985: the aim was to implement forms of welfare and medical assistance, as well as other forms of insurance for Maritime Shipagents and their families, as well as for their respective companies.

Initially participation in the Fund was on a voluntary basis, but the initiative immediately proved popular amongst Members. Based on this favourable premise, the Fund offered itself to manage the category’s obligatory pension fund. A major turning point came in 1995, when Law 549 saw the Fund become an obligatory Welfare Fund for all Maritime Agents, within the framework of obligatory welfare systems.
The obligatory nature of participation in the Fund was reiterated and reinforced both by INPS and the Ministry of Employment: with a memorandum circulated on 25 September 1996, the National Welfare Institute clarified that Shipagents are subject to obligatory welfare contributions which replace that indicated under Article 2, paragraphs 26 and subsequent paragraphs, of law no. 335/95 (separate scheme). The document published by the Ministry of Employment highlighted the obligatory nature of the welfare fund managed by the F.a.m.a. and was dated 26 September 2006.
In addition, in a farsighted move, the F.a.m.a. established the professional Civil Responsibility policy in 2001. Contributions linked to agency fees were raised to 6.80% to enable the Civil Responsibility policy to be taken out to cover Companies. The policy is of a collective nature and is activated automatically by paying the share of the agency fees.

The F.a.m.a. has always focused attention on the Voluntary Welfare system, as well as the forms of Obligatory Welfare. Since 1985, individual or family needs of the Member/Insured party for adding a voluntary contribution to the obligatory contribution stipulated by the law were met when a complementary form of welfare was established.
Our forms of complementary welfare are extremely favourable compared with market conditions and all the welfare policies have provided an excellent yield in recent years: in the last three years, by way of example, these have ranged from a maximum of 4% to a minimum of 3%.