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Belgium’s social security pension system is currently a pay-as-you-go, defined benefit scheme. As in many other countries, the financial sustainability of this architecture is under threat, and the system has many inequities and inconsistencies. A commission was mandated in 2013 to propose structural reforms. The points-based pension developed in the commission’s 2014 report constituted a coherent project for improving the financial sustainability, equity, flexibility and transparency of the country’s statutory pension schemes. The concept of points has, however, raised many fears and failed to convince. The objective of this article is to contextualize and synthesize the proposal for a points-based pension. Given the rejection of the very concept of pension points, we propose an alternative to a points-based pension, i.e. the individual pension account, which aims to meet the reform’s main objectives while avoiding the use of the points concept per se. A comparison will also be made with the notional account mechanism.