Particularities. In Alberta, within 60 days after the delivery to SSQ of the documents required by it following the death of the original owner with a eligible spouse who has not executed the waiver in the Form approved under this legislation. The value of the contract associated with the SSQ LIRA will be transferred, subject to restriction described in the applicable pension legislation, on that surviving spouse’s behalf to an LIRA, an LIF, an annuity that is not a minimum 60% joint life annuity, or a pension plan on a locked-in basis. The eligible spouse must make this choice within 90 days following receipt of satisfactory proof of the contractholder’s death by SSQ. If the choice is not made within the prescribed time period, the eligible spouse is presumed to have chosen payment of an immediate annuity in accordance with applicable pension legislation. SSQ may therefore not be held liable for any loss that may result from such conversion. In Ontario, the eligible spouse is entitled to a death benefit, in conformity with applicable pension legislation, and may choose payment of a lump sum corresponding to the value of the contract associated with the SSQ LIRA, or an immediate or deferred annuity, the redemption value of which is at least equal to the redemption value of this contract. The eligible spouse must make this choice within 90 days following receipt of satisfactory proof of the contractholder’s death by SSQ. If the choice is not made within the prescribed time period, the eligible spouse is presumed to have chosen payment of an immediate annuity in accordance with applicable pension legislation. SSQ may therefore not be held liable for any loss that may result from such conversion. In Quebec, the eligible spouse is entitled to a death benefit, in conformity with applicable pension legislation, payable in the form of a lump sum corresponding to the value of the contract associated with the SSQ LIRA plan. According to federal pension legislation and in other cases where it is provided for, according to applicable pension legislation, when the eligible spouse must transfer the death benefit to a prescribed retirement income arrangement, these arrangements must be in conformity with applicable pension legislation. In British Columbia, a spouse living separate and apart from the contractholder on the date of the Contractholder’s death is not entitled to the death benefit.
Particularities. The three protocols previously described are built upon two types of interaction schemes: centralized and decentralized. These schemes are specified by the way the processes interaction is modeled and by the tasks performed by the coordinator as opposed to other processes. Both the Early Consensus and the Quorum-based protocols rely on a decentralized approach. In these protocols, the coordinator of a round behaves as an initiator, by broadcasting its estimate. Apart from this particular role, the coordinator and the rest of the processes behave in a similar way. In this sense, the protocols provide a uniform manner of describing the behavior of any process in the system. This is no longer the case in the CT protocol. An asymmetry is created between the current coordinator of a round and other processes. The coordinator executes special tasks and has an important role in selecting the estimation value and in deciding a value. The coordinator determines the estimation value and also notifies all other processes when a decision was made. Furthermore, the communication pattern is centralized: all messages are directed to the coordinator. This constraint is relaxed in decentralized approaches as processes cooperate in a dis- tributed manner. Any process can decide a value without needing a special notification from the coordinator. However, the condition for reaching a decision is similar: a process (coordinator or not) must learn that a majority of the processes have adopted the estimation value proposed by the coordinator. Another similarity comes from the fact that a process cannot participate in a previous round. Once it was completed, a round cannot be executed again. In the CT protocol, the rule for progressing to the next round is the following: a process has sent a reply to the current coordinator, either a positive or a negative one, in case of suspecting the coordinator. The Early Consensus protocol introduces a barrier at the end of each round: a process must receive messages from a majority set before proceeding to the next round.
