Separated for eight years, my ex-husband and I divorced 5 years ago. Now retired, our understanding is good and we have become closer once more, to the point of considering living together once more! We are afraid that the Compensation Fund will suspect us of wanting to keep our two full AVS pensions and that these may be modified, especially since we still have the same surname. What does the law say regarding this?
M., Geneva
As a retiree, you are right to ponder this question before considering forming a “roof, table and bed community” – as the case law poetically puts it – with your ex-spouse.
Indeed, as you mention, article 35 of the federal law on old-age and survivors’ insurance provides that the sum of the two pensions for a couple amounts to at most 150% of the maximum amount of the individual old age if both spouses are entitled to such a pension. In other words, married people do not receive two full AVS pensions (i.e. twice 2390 fr. maximum) but only one and a half times the maximum pension to which a person is entitled, i.e. currently at most 3585 fr. per month for the couple.
On the other hand, spouses who no longer live in a common household following a court decision are no longer subject to this ceiling. This notion of the end of the joint household, subject to interpretation, had to be clarified in a directive concerning pensions issued by the Federal Social Insurance Office, pursuant to which spouses are no longer considered to be living in a joint household when their separation has been noted by a judge (typically following a divorce) or that the couple is separated temporarily, or even for an indefinite period following a procedure for protective measures of the conjugal union.
As a divorced couple, it is therefore logical that you and your ex-spouse each currently benefit from a full AHV pension each. However, the aforementioned OFAS directive also provides that pensions remain capped at 150% of the maximum pension if the ex-spouses nevertheless continue to live together following their separation or when they resume living together.
Your decision to live once more in the same accommodation with your ex-spouse therefore actually risks going hand in hand with a reduction in your respective AVS pensions…
Posted today at 08:23
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– Again in a relationship with my ex?
OpinionPascal Rytz – Lawyer
Posted today at 08:23