Divorce

Your pension rights could be one of your most valuable assets, so in the event of divorce or the dissolution of a civil partnership your ex-spouse or ex civil partner may be entitled to part of your pension. Therefore you would be wise, first, to take legal advice on the options available to you.

Both you and your partner should get your pensions valued before you make any decisions or arrangements. Your pensions include any occupational and personal pensions and your State additional pension.

You will need to get a Cash Equivalent Transfer Value (CETV) which will provide specific information about your pension, and the court will take this value into account in your financial settlement. Requests for CETVs must be made in writing or via email to the Peninsula Pensions team. You need to say that you require a CETV for divorce purposes and you should also specify the full address to which you require the details to be sent. The Pensions teamwill need to request information from your employer’s payroll department in order to process the CETV calculation so please allow at least 6 weeks for a full reply. If you have already been issued with aCETV within the last 12 months, there will be a charge for providing a new calculation – for details on when a charge can apply, please refer to our charging schedule.

If you have previously nominated your spouse or civil partner to receive a death grant, this will remain on your pension record until you change it. You may wish to consider completing a new Death Grant Expression of Wish form.

There are three ways that pensions could be handled as part of a financial agreement when you split up. Through the Court, a divorcing couple can choose to:

  1. Balance the pension rights against another asset, such as the matrimonial home (this is known as Pension Offsetting; or
  1. Arrange that when one party’s pension eventually comes into payment, a portion of it will be paid to the other party (this is known as Pension Earmarking); or
  1. Split the pension at the time of the divorce to give both parties their own pension pot for the future (this is known as Pension Sharing).

However,Equiniti / the London Borough of Hackney Pension Fund do not get involved in pension offsetting as this doesn’t entail an order against the pension scheme.

Please see our members’ guide for more information on how your pension could be affected.

Further information:

  • Pension sharing
  • Pension attachment / earmarking