adminPensions are payable for life. This applies to all national pension scheme pensions, including the invalidity pension, so long as the invalidity pensioner remains incapable of working. It is also only possible to be paid one type of NPS pension. Those on invalidity pension are not eligible, therefore, for a retirement pension.
However, when an invalidity pensioner attains 60 years, there is an option to shift to retirement pension where the minimum retirement pension is greater than the invalidity pension being received. In this case the pensioner will receive the minimum retirement pension instead of the lower invalidity pension.
One correspondent said he had been on invalidity benefit since the age of 48. He asked whether this would be changed to a retirement pension when he reaches the age of 60. This depends on how much his invalidity pension is. If the invalidity pension being received is less than the minimum retirement pension then it will be changed to the minimum retirement pension. If it is more, then he will continue to receive his invalidity pension.
An invalidity pension is pay-able to a contributor to the national pension scheme below the age of 60 who has become permanently incapable of working due to a physical or mental disability or illness and who has contributed to the NPS for at least 12 months.
While 10 years of contributions are required to be eligible for a retirement pension, only 12 months of contributions are required for the invalidity pension.
There are a number of implications to this. A person on an invalidity pension might well have not contributed to the NPS for long enough to qualify for a retirement pension. Moreover, a person might be paid an invalidity pension from a relatively young age. If so, he could continue to be paid an invalidity pension for much longer than a retirement pensioner could be expected to continue receiving a retirement pension.
To be eligible for an invalidity pension, a contributor must be medically certified as permanently incapable of work because of a disability or illness. He may have to appear before a medical board. He may have to submit to a medical examination by a doctor nominated by NSSA.
The presumption is that the contributor will never be able to work again in any job. However, the future can be difficult to predict, even by skilled medical practitioners. In some cases what was thought to be a permanent incapacity to work turns out to be a temporary condition.
If the condition of the person on invalidity pension changes, making it possible for him to work again, then he or she is no longer entitled to the invalidity pension. He or she should notify NSSA and the pension payment should cease.
If there is such a recovery, resulting in the former invalidity pensioner returning to work, then the pension should stop and the individual, if he or she is back in formal employment, should resume making contributions to the NPS.
Having ceased to draw an invalidity pension, the former pensioner can continue building up his or her contribution record and apply for a retirement benefit on reaching the appropriate retirement age, which is normally when one retires after reaching the age of 60 or at 65, whether or not one has at that age retired. Whether the retirement benefit is a pension or not will depend on whether his total contribution period amounts to 10 years or more or not.
There is an early retirement age of 55 for those who have spent seven of the previous 10 years in an occupation categorised as arduous.
However, it is unlikely that a person who has recovered after receiving an invalidity pension for what had been thought to be a permanent incapacitation would become engaged in an arduous occupation.
Those who continue to be in- capable of work due to physical or mental ill health and to draw an invalidity pension will continue to draw invalidity pension even in their old age, unless their pension is below the level of the minimum retirement pension, in which case the amount will be increased to that of the minimum retirement pension.
- Send feedback to [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> or text to 0772-307913. Those with individual queries should contact their local NSSA office or telephone NSSA on (04) 706517-8 or 706523-5.
It was mentioned in a previous column article that the spouse of a deceased contributor being paid a survivor’s pension would continue to receive the pension, even if she or he remarried, but would not be eligible for another survivor’s pension if the new marriage partner died.
Two different correspondents enquired whether another relative could be paid the survivor’s pension for the children, in the event of their mother remarrying.
It depends on who is looking after the children. If the children remain with the mother, then she will continue to receive their pension. The children’s pension is a single amount to cover all the children. There is not a separate amount for each child.
If the children are being looked after by somebody else, then NSSA can be asked to make the payment to the guardian on the children’s behalf. NSSA will need to be satisfied, however, that the guardian is in fact the children’s legal guardian. That would normally require a certificate of guardianship.
The children’s pension is only payable where there is at least one child under the age of 18 or where there are children above 18 but below 25 who are in full time education.
- Readers can e-mail issues they would like dealt with in this column to [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> or text them to 0772-307913. Those with individual queries should contact their local NSSA office or telephone NSSA on (04) 706517-8 or 706523-5.
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