When will my investment switch take effect?

You can choose to change or ‘switch’ the investment plan for your GESB Super, West State Super or Retirement Income account at any time. To do this, you can either:

• Submit an investment plan change through Member Online
• Complete and send in the relevant Investment choice form

We will process your investment switch on the first available day after receiving it. Generally, within two to three business days¹ of receiving your request. However, sometimes it may take up to five business days, or longer in exceptional cases, to process your switch.

Please keep in mind that your investment switch will take effect on the day it’s processed, rather than on the day it’s submitted or received. The day we process your switch is known as the ‘effective date’.

We won’t know the unit price until after your switch has taken effect

The unit price on the ‘effective date’ of your switch will be applied to the transaction.

However, this price won’t be available until the next business day after your request has been processed. This is because we use what’s known as ‘forward unit pricing’ to value your investment and any transactions on your account. To learn more, see our unit prices explained page.

Once the unit price has been finalised and applied to your switch, the process is complete. Your account balance and any future contribution or payment into your account (for example, a rollover), will be invested immediately into your new investment plan.

If you’ve submitted our paper ‘Investment choice’ form, we’ll send you confirmation once we have processed the changes to your investment plan. If you’ve completed our online form, you’ll be able to see the details of the transaction in Member Online, usually within five business days of the ‘effective date’ of your switch.

We cannot guarantee the unit price that will apply to your switch

We aim to process all switches within five business days. However, we cannot guarantee the exact processing date – or the unit price – for any individual request.

From time to time, it may take us longer than five business days to process your switch, due to factors outside of our control. For example, if there is a material change in the value of an asset class, we may temporarily suspend transactions and unit prices to ensure fairness among our members. If this happens, we will always let you know through the unit prices page of this website.

Changing your investment plan may result in a loss

Unit prices change daily, based on the market value of our assets at the close of business each day. This means that changing your investment plan when markets are fluctuating may result in a loss in the value of your investment.

For tips on investing in super during a market downturn, see our Investing during market volatility page.

1 A business day is a work day other than a public holiday or weekend in Western Australia.