Police pension and divorce

ludo43

Can anyone offer any advice. I’m in the early stages of financial settlement discussions pre divorce and not sure how my police pension division would work. A few years to retirement and would ideally like to offset the capital in the house against the pension - however could my stbxw claim any of my pension and how does it get assigned to her if so? 

xylophone

https://yourpensionservice.org.uk/media/1109/police-divorce-factsheet.pdf

https://www.gov.uk/money-property-when-relationship-ends

https://www.moneyhelper.org.uk/en/family-and-care/divorce-and-separation/divorce-and-money-calculator

https://mensadviceline.org.uk/legal-information/financial-settlements-on-divorce-2-step-by-step-process/

Silvertabby

At some point, probably sooner rather than later, you'll be asked to provide a pension valuation.  This can only be calculated by police pensions, noting that you will have to specify that the CETV is required for divorce purposes.

The value is classed as a marital asset.  If your ex is awarded a PSO ( pension sharing order) then the allotted %age of your pension will be placed into a separate pension account in her own name.  One thing to note with police/fire/ armed forces pensions in particular - ie, those with an earlier than SPA retirement date - is that even if your own pension is payable after 30 years(?) your ex's pension will have a normal payment date of SPA.  ie, 67 or 68 depending on her DOB.

Or the value may be taken as a bigger share of another asset, typically a house.

My background is LGPS but I suspect that the police pension stats are very similar.  ie, despite doing umpteen divorce valuations, less than 10%  progressed to actual PSOs, presumably because the ex took a bigger bite of the house instead.

As long as the 'clean break' is done properly, if your ex opts for other assets in lieu of a PSO then she can't come back for another bite at a later date.

Marcon

ludo43 said:

Can anyone offer any advice. I’m in the early stages of financial settlement discussions pre divorce and not sure how my police pension division would work. A few years to retirement and would ideally like to offset the capital in the house against the pension - however could my stbxw claim any of my pension and how does it get assigned to her if so? 

If your spouse is in agreement, then what you plan shouldn't cause any issues. Just make sure you have a solicitor who understands your intentions and that the financial settlement is clear and acceptable to you and your ex.