For more than a year, the Retirement Guidance Council has been considering changes to family and marital rights, including survivor’s pensions. Changes in age conditions, the method of calculation or even the conditions for remarriage, many hypotheses are on the table.
Capital Video: Survivor’s pension: towards a total overhaul of the rights of the surviving spouse from 2026?
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– Survivor’s pension rules could change in 2026.
Big bang in sight for survivor’s pension? The members of the Pension Orientation Council (Cor) are currently working on different scenarios for the evolution of family and marital rights for retirement. Among the files studied, that of the survivor’s pension, part of the deceased spouse’s pension paid to the surviving spouse. Mandated by the government, in May 2023, to rethink these systems, the Cor organized a working session on the subject, this Thursday, October 17. After having sent, at the beginning of the year, a questionnaire to its forty members (deputies, senators, trade unionists, employers, representatives of administrations), he presented their responses during this session.
Looking at the feedback, a consensus emerges: we must harmonize reversion devices. Today, there are more than forty, almost as many as there are pension plans. Age to benefit from it, amount paid… nothing is the same from one plan to another. To make the rules more readable, the portion of the deceased spouse’s pension paid to the surviving spouse could be the same in all plans. Currently, it is 54% under the general scheme while it reaches 60% for the supplementary pension for private Agirc-Arrco employees. “Initially, it is proposed to simulate the unification of reversion rates at the currently lowest rate, 50%, at the highest rate, 60%, or at an intermediate rate of 55%.writes Le Cor in a working document.
How much will your pension increase thanks to the revaluation of Agirc-Arrco?
Towards a new method of calculating survivor’s pension
Another point studied, the age limit. If it is necessary to have at least 55 years old To receive a survivor’s pension under the general scheme or Agirc-Arrco, there is no limit for civil servants. For the Horn, harmonization could be achieved by “aligning the minimum age to 55 years or removing it”. It is also worth seeing whether or not the condition of non-remarriage would be maintained for civil servants. The latter cannot receive the reversion if they remarry. On this removal, opinions are rather divided while a consensus emerges to open reversion to couples in a civil partnership or living together.
In addition to harmonization of the system, the Cor also offers several long-term developments. The first concerns the method of calculation with the aim of maintaining the standard of living of the surviving spouse. The scenario studied would be to determine the amount of the survivorship by making the difference between two thirds of the deceased’s pension and one third of the surviving spouse’s pension.
Survivor’s pension: be careful not to forget this process at Agirc-Arrco
Another change studied is the double proration of the pension which would be based on the duration of insurance and the total duration of marriage. The idea is that the acquired rights correspond “periods of solidarity linked to marriage”it is explained in the working documents of Cor. Translation: the survivor’s pension paid would be calculated in proportion to the duration of the marriage in relation to the duration of insurance in the pension plan.
These scenarios will now be submitted to evaluation of their feasibilitytheir cost and possible side effects. The idea is not to create any losers. “These development proposals, which still need to be adjusted once the results of the simulations are available, do not bind the members of the Cor, nor do they claim to prejudge future decisions,” warns the Council. According to a member of the Cor, all these studies must be presented at the beginning of next year. The institution retains, “on a conventional basis”an implementation of the measures that will be adopted for deaths occurring from January 1, 2026.
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