Lawyer in pension cases

The right to a pension in Ukraine is enshrined in Article 46 of the Constitution of Ukraine, which refers to social protection in case of total, temporary or partial disability.

This may also apply to the loss of the breadwinner, old age and other cases mentioned in the current legislation. For the team of lawyers working at Prikhodko & Partners Law Firm, client requests related to pension law are a rather large layer of work. We are well aware from practice how often a pension lawyer is the most requested specialist.

We have good experience in such cases because we work with them regularly. Moreover, it is worth noting that a large number of lawsuits currently pending in administrative courts are related to pensioners defending their rights violated by the Pension Fund. Let’s talk in more detail about why this happens and how our pension lawyer, can help in such cases, for whom working in the field of pension law is a familiar daily routine, where effective algorithms have been established to help clients as efficiently and effectively as possible.

What should you know about pensions?

Ukrainian legislation stipulates that a citizen must have a pension that is not lower than the established subsistence level. However, in practice, things can be different, as Pension Fund officials are often the ones who do not take the side of the pensioner, but violate his or her rights under the current legislation.

For example, this may apply to situations where:

• a pension is set at a level lower than the subsistence minimum, which is expressly prohibited by law;
• a pensioner is faced with the fact that his or her pension is stopped (for example, in cases of traveling abroad, despite having sufficient insurance record in Ukraine);
• a pension is denied for artificially created reasons (e.g., “unclear entries” in the work record book or problems with job certification when granting a pension under List 1 or List 2);
• pensioners are denied pension recalculation in cases where they are fully entitled to it.

The above are just some of the categories of cases that clients regularly address. In fact, there may be many more reasons to apply, because each situation is individual, and the specific attitude of Pension Fund representatives to the rights of pensioners has long been an obvious and sad trend.

Military and civilian pensions

In addition to the list of issues mentioned earlier, we can also say that the cases we are dealing with are conditionally divided into so-called military and civilian pensions. In the first case, we are referring to client inquiries on a range of issues related to pensions of military personnel, former police officers and representatives of law enforcement agencies, who are covered by identical legislation. For example, these are cases involving the recalculation of pensions for representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs or the State Protection Department.

In the second case, we deal with all other categories of pensions. In addition, a separate group can be formed by supporting cases related to pensions of certain categories of people, for example, Chernobyl victims, namely lifting the restriction on the amount of pension for Chernobyl victims.

Thus, inquiries about military pensions are relevant issues:

1. recalculation of pensions for military personnel, taking into account all allowances, surcharges, promotions and bonuses (in particular, this applies to those who retired before 2018);
2. return of the UAH 2 thousand surcharge in accordance with the provisions of Government Resolution № 713;
3. removal of restrictions on the maximum amount of pension, which were established by Article 43 of Law 2262-XII, but later recognized as contrary to the Constitution of Ukraine;
4. restoring the proper percentage of the pension in case it was unlawfully reduced to 70%.

As for the issues related to civilian pensions, they usually relate to the refusal to grant a pension, its recalculation and crediting of service. For example, our practice in dealing with such inquiries shows that representatives of the Pension Fund often refuse to credit preferential service.

We are also frequently contacted by Chernobyl victims who have faced an unlawful refusal to lift the restrictions on the maximum pension amount. These are the restrictions established by Article 67 of Law № 796-XII. And finally, it is worth mentioning the problem faced by civil servants when they are denied a transfer from an old-age pension to a civil servant pension. Also, in such cases, representatives of the Pension Fund, as a rule, refuse to credit the existing civil service record.

How do we work?

When pensioners contact us about their violated rights, during the initial consultation, the specialists of Prikhodko & Partners Law Firm analyze in detail the specifics of the case and how to help. As a rule, everything goes according to a fairly typical scenario, when you first need to apply to the Pension Fund and get a refusal in your matter, and then, having such an official refusal in hand, you should file a lawsuit. If a pensioner has already applied to the Pension Fund on their own and received a refusal, then we immediately plan a strategy for representing them in court.

To get legal advice on pension matters, please fill out the form on the website and our lawyer will contact you shortly.