Your Pension from
Germany
Statutory pension insurance in Germany used to be divided into the Federal Insurance Institution for Salaried Employees, more than 16 state administrations and other insurance institutions tailored to specific professions such as miners, seamen, railroad employees, etc.
With a few exceptions, all these individual institutions and administrations were merged into a single administration, the “Deutsche Rentenversicherung - Bund”, with regional offices in each federal state.
This means that there is now a single insurance provider in Germany.
This makes it easier to assert existing claims in Germany.
The German Pension Insurance
Do a quick check to find out whether you are entitled to draw a pension from the German Social Security Administration!
Invest half an hour of your time - we will do the rest!
Here is how:
Click here or call us at +1-505-328-7777 and ask for our questionnaire. Fill out the questionnaire and send it back to us via e-mail or the Postal Service.
We will analyse your data and quickly give you a Feedback.
There are no obligations to you and you alone decide how to proceed. If your data shows that upon retirement you are owed any money from the German government we offer to you our expert services to get you your money!
This is solely your decision!
For the questionnaire and its quick analysis we will charge a one-time fee of $ 25.00
Social Security Benefits
The German Social Security Insurance offers the following:
(a) a pension at age 67 the latest,
(b) disability benefits in case you are not able to work prior to turning 65,
(c) survivor benefits in case of the death of a spouse,
(d) benefits if you are raised as an orphan up to age 27,
(e) benefits for a divorced spouse raising one or more children.
For employees born after 1946, the retirement age is gradually being raised to 67.
If an insured employee becomes so ill that they are unable to work, they can also apply for a pension. This reduced earning capacity pension („Erwerbsminderungsrente“) can be granted for a limited period of time and the amount of benefits depends on the number and amount of contributions paid and the degree of disability.
In case of the death of a spouse the surviving spouse (depending on the age) can apply for survivor benefits. Those benefits will, however, be partially charged against the survivor's own income – be it in the form of a pension or any income through work.
In case one or both parents of a child die before the child turns 18, the surviving child can receive semi- or full orphan benefits.
If the surviving child is still in job-training or any other job-related schooling the age limit will go up to 27.
In case a divorced spouse dies, the surviving divorced spouse can under certain conditions apply for special benefits to help pay for a child's education.
Conditions for receiving a pension
In order to receive Social Security benefits you have to meet the following qualifications:
-
You will receive a pension at the age of 65 if you have completed the prescribed waiting period of at least 60 months.
Women born before 1952 can receive their benefits at the age of 60 if they have accumulated at least 120 months of contributions after the age of 40 and have completed a waiting period of at least 15 years.
Insured persons born before January 2nd, 1961 are entitled to a disability pension if they have had a contribution period of at least 18 months in the last 5 years before becoming disabled and if they have completed the mandatory waiting period of 60 months (see above).
Insured persons born after January 1st, 1961 can receive a pension for partial or total disability under the same conditions as above.
In order to receive survivors' benefits, the deceased spouse must have completed a waiting period of at least 5 years or have already drawn a pension.
In order to receive benefits for partial or full orphans or for the guardian to receive benefits for raising children, a mandatory waiting period of at least 5 years must have been observed.
Types of Insurances
As an employee your pension insurance is mandatory. Your employer deducts every month from your paycheck the contributions for Social Security and forwards that amount of money to the insurance carrier. The insurance carrier registers the month for which the money has been paid and the amount of your salary by which the amount of your contributions are determined. The same applies for workers who are in an apprenticeship or any other form of professional training.
Under certain conditions students may also be required to pay their contributions into the system. This happens when the student during his or her stay at a college or university holds a job on the side and the resulting salary exceeds a certain annual amount.
Members of the military and other civil services enjoy an automatic pension insurance without having to contribute out of their own pockets. The duration of their services is equal to any required waiting period.
For unemployed workers who are drawing unemployment benefits, the Department of Labor will pay the contributions on their behalf.
Males and females who have raised their own children in germany will receive credits on their accounts with the insurance carrier in the form of monthly contributions.
All paid and credited monthly contributions on your insurance carrier's account will be added up and will determine the time-period you have been insured. Together with the amount of your contributions it will determine the amount of your pension pay-outs.
Therefore it is of absolute importance that ALL monthly contributions are registered by the insurance carrier and credited to your account.
We will help you with making sure that your account is properly credited by providing proof to the insurance carrier in cases of missing data.
Insurance Categories
As a rule, all employees are obliged to pay into the statutory pension insurance scheme. The employer deducts the pension insurance contribution from the employee's monthly payroll and forwards the money to the insurance provider.
For certain professions, it is possible to apply for compulsory insurance.
It is also possible to take out insurance on a voluntary basis. If you have been insured under one of these three categories in the past, please contact us.
It may also be advisable to check whether voluntary insurance or even supplementary insurance would be beneficial for you. Ask us and we will provide you with the information you need.
Procedures Of The European Pension Insurers
All pension insurance carriers record the times, your annual contributions, the amounts of your salaries and all other for your pension relevant information and data in your insurance account. This account reflects your professional career as far as it is relevant for the calculation of your pension.
Any missing data, false recordings or mistakes will have a negative impact on the amount of your eventual pension pay outs.
Please let us establish for you what information has been credited to your pension account and make sure that all the data are correct.
We will point out to you how you can check the correctness and completeness of these recordings and assist you if needed in the necessary corrections and/or supplementations of your data.
Your pension account is as important as your bank account! Make sure you are in control of it!
-
A pension is only granted after an application has been submitted to the pension insurance fund. The application consists of several pages of a pre-printed form that the applicant must complete.
German pension insurance takes around four to six months to process the application, provided that all documents have been submitted, there are no ambiguities, no queries and no requests for further evidence.
In view of this, we recommend that you have us check the status of your insurance account at the latest at the age of 60 or at least 5 years before your planned retirement to ensure that all information has been recorded and that these records are correct so that
you receive the maximum possible payouts. For example, if one of your previous German employers had paid incorrect or incomplete contributions, you would only find out after the pension insurance company has approved your pension. It would then require a fairly extensive, expensive and time-consuming effort on your part to have the necessary corrections made to your pension account, during which time you would receive no pension or at best a token pension.
We therefore urge you, regardless of your current age, to collect and save all information on your professional activity in Germany now and to coordinate this information with the German pension insurance.
You should also do this if you plan to return to work in Germany at some point in the future.
We can tell you from experience that it is very difficult to correct mistakes made by a German employer or a German authority after 10 or 20 years. To correct such mistakes after such a long period of time, you will need extensive evidence; and the more time has passed, the more difficult it will be to obtain this evidence.
Use the time until your planned retirement wisely. Engage us now so that we can assist you in clarifying all the details.
-
All pension insurance providers record the periods, your annual contributions, the amount of your salary and all other information and data relevant to your pension in your insurance account. This account reflects your career history insofar as it is relevant to the calculation of your pension.
Missing data, incorrect records or errors will have a negative impact on the amount of your possible pension payments.
Let us find out for you what information has been credited to your pension account and make sure that all the data is correct.
We will show you how to check the accuracy and completeness of these records and help you make any necessary corrections and/or additions to your data.
Your pension account is as important as your bank account! Make sure you have it under control!
-
You can request corrections to your pension account at any time, even after many years.
If data is missing or incorrect in your account, you are generally not responsible for these errors. However, you must prove that the information is actually incorrect. Evidence may include employment references, certificates, payslips and even the testimony of a witness.
We offer our specialized service to help you correct incorrect or missing data in your pension account.
We investigate at source through our German partner, who may interview witnesses, check with public offices (files) and even locate people who could shed light on your problems.
As this can turn into an extensive effort, we will advise you whether our time and your costs are worthwhile if the result is worth the effort in terms of research, costs, etc.
-
If our research shows that periods and/or contributions are missing from your pension account or that, for example, one or more of your jobs have not been recorded, this will of course have a negative impact on the amount of your potential pension payments.
We will help you to research and add the missing periods and contributions to your pension account.
On the occasion that documents are missing, we go to the source and support you in your research. We interview witnesses, make enquiries at offices and authorities and even try to locate certain people if they can shed light on your problem.
In case it turns out that our investigations are quite extensive and time-consuming, we can give you an assessment of whether the effort and cost of obtaining the requested documents is worth the increase in your pension payments.
Insurance Periods
A distinction is made between:
compulsory insurance periods
periods of voluntary insurance
periods of child-raising
credited periods
-
As an employee your pension insurance is mandatory. Your employer deducts every month from your salary the Social Security contributions and forwards those amounts of money to the insurance carrier. The insurance carrier registers every month for which the mandatory insurance has been paid as insurance-months.
-
In case there is no mandatory insurance you can make your contributions on a voluntary basis. You pay your monthly contributions, thus creating the necessary insurance period. The amount of your pension depends on the number of months you paid contributions (insurance-period) and the amount of your contributions.
-
In case you have raised your own biological children or have adopted one or more children or you are a foster parent the female guardian (or mother) will normally receive a certain insurance-period credit. If both parents apply, this credit will also be given to the male guardian.
-
There are certain provisions under which you will be given credit for contributions even if you have not paid your monthly dues. This will happen if you have been a prisoner of war (POW), have been persecuted by the NS, are a political fugitive or have been a political prisoner in the DDR etc.
German Pensions in the US
As a recipient of pension insurance benefits from a German insurance provider, you can have your payments transferred to a bank account abroad.
However, the amount of the payments depends on the recipient's nationality status and country of residence, as well as the exchange rate, which can vary from month to month.
You can apply for your pension from Deutsche Rentenversicherung from any country outside Germany. All you have to do is request the relevant application forms in German (!) from the administration and make sure that all supporting documents are in German. (The application forms for applicants in the USA and Canada are bilingual).
OFSS specializes in assisting applicants living abroad and handles all matters with the German insurance institutions in a professional manner.
You provide OFSS with appropriate instructions, which are faithfully followed.
Pension and Divorce
If you get divorced, a pension equalization is usually carried out in the German pension insurance system. This involves splitting the pension entitlements acquired individually by the husband and wife during the marriage, usually in such a way that the sum of both entitlements is divided equally between the two spouses.
This is a complicated procedure with many consequences, as the person with the higher entitlement has to give up part of their entitlement.
Make sure that this procedure is carried out correctly, regardless of whether you had to surrender claims or were able to gain them!
We will support you!
-
The social security authorities of Germany and the USA have signed an agreement that guarantees the citizens of the respective partner country certain rights, also known as a social security agreement.
Generally speaking, the agreement stipulates that the partner countries treat the citizens of the other country similarly to their own citizens in terms of social security. It is not insignificant that periods of wage-dependent employment in the other country are recognized by the partner country. This can mean, for example, that periods of employment in the other country are recognized as qualifying periods in the partner country.
Secure these benefits as provided for in this agreement. In this way, you can increase the return on the contributions you have paid.
We specialize in helping people who live in the USA, for example, and expect to receive pension payments from the German pension insurance scheme at some point.
-
Generally, if you meet all the requirements, you can receive your pension from Germany at the same time as social security benefits from the US or another country.
All you need to do is ask us to help you prepare your application and guide you through the lengthy and complex process until success is guaranteed.
You will need to apply for your US pension with the US Social Security Administration and also state that you are entitled to a pension from Germany.
If you wish, our American partner can also help you with this.
OFSS will be happy to assist you with your pension application in Germany.
-
Have you worked in more than two countries and paid pension insurance contributions there?
In principle, provided you have met all the requirements in the respective countries, you can receive pensions simultaneously from each country in which you have worked and made your contributions.
The resulting income tax due on these payments to you must be paid by you in the country in which you are resident or in the country to which these pensions are transferred.
The tax rules are different in each country, so we cannot provide any information on tax issues. However, we can help you to find experts who can give you binding advice on tax issues.
We work with experts who are fluent in the languages of the respective countries and can put you in touch with legal advisors or lawyers who can also represent you in court if necessary.