Foreign wife trying to claim my dead fathers pension benefits

swan1981

Mr Father has recently passed away, he worked for Royal Mail for 3 years in the 1980's. I was aware he may have deferred pension benefits but did not bother trying to claim these as I did not think it would add to much so was not worth it.

I have today received a letter from Royal Mail asking for a copy of my birth Certificate as his wife in South America is trying to claim his pension.

My Dad died whilst living in South America although he was a British Citizen. He married his wife who is Brazilian around 5 years ago in the UK but I dont think they were married under Brazilian Law. He lived in America for around 5 years before he died.

As far as I am aware he never left a will, I have never been bothered trying to claim whatever he had in Brazil (which was not much) but I am furious of the cheek of this woman who comes from a wealthy family trying to claim my Dads benefits especially as she begged me to pay for most of the funeral which I did as I wanted him to have a proper send off and I will do anything to make sure she does not get a penny.

Are his 3 children (myself included) entitled to this deferred pension or should it go to his Brazilian Wife?

Bear in mind this pension was from the 1980's and he has only been married to her for 5 years - thats is the marriage is even legal!

Spirit_2

Adult children are not usually beneficiaries of occupational pension schemes. Spouses are. It is not 'cheek' on her part but a normal pensions survivor benefit.

To cheer yourself up though, just think - 3 years membership is unlikley to have generated much pension entitlement.

dzug1

Two possibilities -

the entitlement to the pension is at the discretion of the pension fund trustees - so they will decide based on the claims made to them. I'm sure a widow would have high priority.

the entitlement to the pension is determined by intestacy law. If that's UK intestacy law his widow is entitled to both it and all the rest of his estate, assuming it didn't amount to much. If it's brazilian law, don't know but would be surprised if the widow wasn't entitled to at least something, possibly everything. Maybe some of it only in trust rather than absolutely.

Why would Brazil not recognise a UK marriage?

Sorry, I fear you are on a loser.

swan1981

Not really bothered about the money as it won't be much, but this woman is unbelievable, she tried to shake me down for so much money at the funeral she is the devil and they are one of the richest families in Northern Brazil. If we lose - we lose but got to fight for it my Dad would turn in his grave if he knew what she was really like.

fabforty

swan1981 wrote: »

Not really bothered about the money as it won't be much, but this woman is unbelievable, she tried to shake me down for so much money at the funeral she is the devil and they are one of the richest families in Northern Brazil. If we lose - we lose but got to fight for it my Dad would turn in his grave if he knew what she was really like.

She was his wife. Your father chose to marry her and after five years of marriage, I suspect he knew what she was really like (whatever that is). He made his choice. You might not like it, or her, but it was his choice and you should respect that.

dzug1

swan1981 wrote: »

Not really bothered about the money as it won't be much, but this woman is unbelievable, she tried to shake me down for so much money at the funeral she is the devil and they are one of the richest families in Northern Brazil. If we lose - we lose but got to fight for it my Dad would turn in his grave if he knew what she was really like.

And it's not about the money then?

Andy_L

swan1981 wrote: »

If we lose - we lose but got to fight for it my Dad would turn in his grave if he knew what she was really like.

Condolences on your loss..however this is an issue between her & the RM pension scheme. You have no legal connection so cannot fight it.
Even if you could it would be a clear cut case of the scheme rules: she's either entitled to a spouses pension because they were married when he died or not because they weren't married when he left the scheme (IMO, based on other public sector-esque schemes, it's most likely to be the former)

seven-day-weekend

I would have thought that if your Father's marriage was legal (and why shouldn't it be if they married in the UK), then his wife would be entitled to at least some of his Pension. Whether she is already wealthy or not has nothing to do with it. If she was his wife she is his next of kin, you are not.

jh2009

If you haven't done so, the royal mail website may be worth a look to see what the rules on their spouse pension provisions are:

http://www.royalmailpensionplan.co.uk/

Death benefits tend to be:

a) spouse pension - commonly payable automatically to a surviving spouse.

b) lump sum benefit

Looking at the two:

a) spouse pension

Most pension schemes provide a spouse pension automatically to a spouse, and its rare for a trustee to sit in judgement on a marriage, regardless of what the family think of the spouse. In fact parts of any spouse pension belong legally to a spouse regardless of the state of the marriage at death/pension scheme rules.

Some Schemes though can "review" the pension payable to a spouse if there is any evidence that the marriage had broken down at death. In this case they may choose just to pay the legal minimum they have to pay. Evidence they would look for would be if there was evidence the marriage had broken down (eg member and spouse living at different addresses at death).

Others operate a "gold digger" rule where they investigate suspicious marriages (eg a 20 year old marrying a 90 year old who dies days after the wedding). These generally tend to apply to short marriages, eg within 6 months, rather than 5 years.

Others will reduce a spouse pension if a spouse is significantly younger than their spouse (eg if they are 30 and the spouse was 70 they may pay a lower pension).

You have said that they are looking for copies of your birth certificate. Im not sure why they would request this as a condition of payment of the spouse pension. Although you may be powerless to stop a benefit being paid, you are also under no obligation to help them set such a benefit up.

If you have strong feelings the marriage wasn't genuine (ideally with evidence that they were living apart at death) then you could write to the scheme. Although this is likely only to affect the level of any pension paid to his wife vs stopping the pension being paid. Any reduction could not be payable to any other party (unless theres any children below 21 in full time education, or any disabled children above that age).

b) Lump sum death benefit

This hasnt been mentioned in your posts, but is a possibility.

This may be a guarantee of eg 5 years of pension payments if your father was old enough to retire at death (assuming he took retirement on the day he died). Alternatively the scheme may provide a refund of contributions rather than this sort of benefit. You would have to ask the scheme for confirmation if such a benefit may be payable.

If there is a benefit it is likely to be payable to his spouse, but if you have evidence of the marriage having broken down, then the trustee may have the power to consider this benefit (if there is one) for other dependants.

If you write to the trustee though, you would have to concentrate on facts/evidence about the marriage itself, rather than any form of opinion or personal attack on the spouse/marriage.

Evidence they would want would be that the marriage had broken down, details of any dependancy anyone else may have had on your father. Even the death certificate if this says "seperated" or shows your father and his spouse at different addresses at death could be used.

Andy_L

jh2009 wrote: »

You have said that they are looking for copies of your birth certificate. Im not sure why they would request this as a condition of payment of the spouse pension.

Perhaps the're checking to see if they have to pay part of any survivors pension to the OP as well as the widow

jh2009

Perhaps they're checking to see if they have to pay part of any survivors pension to the OP as well as the widow

They possibly are checking the OP's age to rule out any child pensions as thats the only likely reason the OP would get a pension from the Plan. Am sure a phone call to the scheme by the OP can resolve that.

They might also be checking the birth cert to see if the fathers name is on it. A Scheme i worked for once obtained a childs birth certificate to confirm parentage, and then part of a lump sum death benefit was paid to the child. (this was though a case where the parents never married and the son had the mothers name). They may have to do this if the son appears on any nomination form for any lump sum death benefit.

Again i guess a call to the scheme on why they need the certificate could clear this up.

Could be a box ticking exercise so all the data is presented to the trustee or there may be more significant reasons. In addition to my earlier post, some schemes do also make more of an effort to check out foreign brides living overseas who claim pensions/lump sums on death.