José Antonio Benito, fired and forced to retire with 61 years: “I started working with 14 years and with 45 years quoted they have removed 24% of my life pension”

In Spain, the Public Social Security Pension System allows to advance the ordinary retirement age through early retirement in situations that are alien to the worker’s will. Thus, the early, involuntary or forced retirement allows that advance, but knowing that social security will apply reducing coefficients, which can reach up to 30% of the pension and that are applied permanently. These quotes can sometimes be unfair, especially for those retirees who, with more than 45 years quoted have lost their jobs and are forced to choose between retirement in advance and suffer a cut or wait to find work while they see how their regulatory base is also reduced (which is the one that determines the future retirement pension).

This is the case of Jose Antonio Benito, a retiree from Aranda del Duero who, in an interview with News work, He explained the injustice he has suffered with his retirement. This man explains that he began working with 14 years and that for almost his entire working life he was doing for the Pascual company, as a section manager. With the 2009 crisis, Pascual proceeded to fire him with 53 years (he explains that it was an inadmissible dismissal), so he had to start collecting unemployment.

After exhausting this, he went to Social Security to explain that after a long work life he did not “want to see his harmed retirement pension, since social security takes into account the last 25 years of contribution” and adds “that he, always had a regulatory base above 3,000 euros.” He explains that a Social Security official told him that he could benefit from the “special agreements” to pay his money the contribution bases and that his pension was not harmed.

Therefore, they told him that if he wanted to continue maintaining his regulatory base he should pay a quota of 600 euros, but being an elevated cost for him, he was offered to pay 400 euros, but knowing that the pension would be reduced and that he would have a pension of about 2,100 euros approximately, according to the Social Security simulator.

Well, it was for 5 years, until the subsidy began to collect for over 55 years (now known as subsidy for over 52 years) of the State Public Employment Service (SEPE). This subsidy, in addition to having an indefinite duration until they find work or reach the ordinary retirement age, also quotes for the pension.

A social security error that cost him 600 euros

Upon arriving at 61 and after several years without finding work, he decided to go to Social Security to request early retirement and took a surprise. The pension, which told him that he was going to charge of approximately 2,100 euros, in the end he stayed in the 1,639.66 euros, which with the retentions of IRPF stayed at 1,450.61 euros, as seen in the Social Security report.

In the Social Security Charter, a 24%cut was applied, for having advanced its ordinary age for a maximum of 4 years (of the 65 years and 61 years), as recorded by Law 27/2011 (it can be consulted in this BOE). Seeing this situation, he decided to go to Social Security.

Jose Antonio explains that the Social Security official told him that “he had made a mistake.” Apparently, the official explained that instead of taking into account the last 25 years, in accordance with the current standard, they only took into account the last 15 years, so the contribution bases of the years that were working in Pascual with their respective higher contribution bases were not taken into account. This was a loss of 600 euros per month.

After not being satisfied, he decided to go to talk to the Secretary of Social Security, since what they had done with his pension after 45 years quoting “was not fair.” After going to the provincial management and talking to the secretary, he told him that he did not put the law, “which was what there was and that the advancement of his retirement was a cut of almost a quarter.

Now explain, a Newsstrobajothe injustice he suffered. “I started working since I was 14 years old and with 50 years I saw that nobody wanted to hire myself. Then social security has hit me a stick of 600 euros per month … think they are 7,200 euros a year and that it will be until I die,” he laments. He also adds that it is not fair to punish those who have quoted the system most, while then, there are workers with 15 years quoted who do not reach the minimum pension and social security gives them a complement to make them reach said amount (provided that certain requirements are met). Therefore, Jose Antonio believes that the system has unfairly punished him, after having contributed “like nobody.”