If you die before taking your deferred benefits the amount of death grant depends on when you left the scheme:
Left the scheme with deferred benefits before 1 April 2008
A death grant of three times your deferred annual pension is paid.
Left the scheme with deferred benefits after 31 March 2008
A death grant of five times your deferred annual pension is paid.
The death grant that is payable may be affected if you have active membership elsewhere in the Local Government Pension Scheme.
You can let us know who you want to receive the death grant. If you have not already made your wishes known or you wish to update your nomination, please either login to My Pension Online or can complete a Death Grant Nomination Form and send it to the Pensions Section.
Survivor’s pension
A pension is payable to your husband, wife or civil partner and if you left the scheme on or after 1 April 2008 and are eligible, a pension for your cohabiting partner.
The survivor’s pension is payable immediately after your death for the rest of their life and will be adjusted every year in line with the cost of living.
Eligible cohabiting partner
An eligible cohabiting partner is a partner you are living with who, at the date of your death, has met all of these conditions for a continuous period of at least two years:
- you and your cohabiting partner are, and have been, free to marry each other or enter into a civil partnership with each other, and
- you and your cohabiting partner have been living together as if you were a married couple or civil partners, and
- neither you nor your cohabiting partner has been living with someone else as if you / they were a married couple or civil partners, and
- either your cohabiting partner is and has been dependent on you, or you are and have been financially interdependent on each other.
Your partner is financially dependent on you if you have the highest income. Financially interdependent means that you rely on your joint finances to support your standard of living. It doesn’t mean that you need to be contributing equally. For example, if your partner’s income is more than yours, he or she may pay the mortgage and most of the bills and you may pay for the weekly shopping. We will ask for evidence of joint finances for the two years prior to the date of death such as:
- Joint mortgage statements
- Joint bank statements
- Joint Council Tax statements
- Joint utility bills
- Joint house insurance policies
When you die, a survivor’s pension would be paid to your cohabiting partner if:
- all of the above conditions were met on your date of death, and
- your cohabiting partner satisfies the Fund that these conditions had been met for a continuous period of two years immediately before your death.
You don’t have to provide us with details of your cohabiting partner but we recommend that you do using the Nomination of Co-habiting Partner for Survivors Pension form.
Please see LGPS Member website for further information.
Child’s pension
A child’s pension is also due to any eligible child/children. The amount of pension depends on the number of children and whether a survivor’s pension will be paid. Where a pension is payable to two or more children the pension will be shared equally.