Following the adoption and release of the amendments to the Law on Pension and Disability Insurance, the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund will notify proportional pensioners about the required documentation for claiming income compensation up to the minimum pension of 450 euros.

This information was provided to “Vijesti” by the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund when inquiring whether proportional pensioners need to submit documentation regarding their income from other countries to either the Fund or the Ministry of Social Welfare to receive additional amounts if their overall income falls below the minimum pension threshold.

Required Documentation

However, the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund has not specified the exact documentation that proportional pension beneficiaries will need to submit with their applications for this benefit. The proposed law amendments indicate that payment of the difference to reach the minimum pension will commence from the first day of the month following the application submission. This emphasizes the importance for beneficiaries to apply promptly to start receiving their additional benefits as soon as possible. Unofficial reports from “Vijesti” suggest that beneficiaries of the proportional pension will need to include the following documents with their application for this benefit: a copy of their identification card, a residence certificate, a statement from a foreign insurance provider detailing the pension amount, and if they have pensions from multiple countries, they must provide documentation from those nations along with a copy of the decision on the recognition of their foreign pension rights.

Parliamentary Session Agenda

The amendments to the Pension and Disability Insurance Act, discussed in the Parliament session that commenced yesterday post-unblocking, propose that proportional pensioners whose total pension income is below 450 euros will receive assistance to reach that amount.

“As the law is a normative act passed by the Parliament of Montenegro following a specially determined procedure, we inform you that the draft Law on Amendments regarding proportional pensions is currently under consideration in Parliament. It is essential to note that the entire process concludes with its publication in the Official Gazette of Montenegro, marking its entry into force. Once this procedure concludes and the law comes into effect, the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund of Montenegro will, in accordance with its competencies and legal provisions, begin implementation and inform the public about the necessary documentation for payment adjustments based on the lowest pension amount for proportional pension beneficiaries,” stated the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund, without providing specifics on the required documentation.

Approximately 3,500 Pensioners Await a Raise

Montenegro has about 11,000 proportional pensioners who are citizens of the country, having acquired their work experience across two or more former Yugoslav states or other nations over the decades, preventing them from having a consolidated work history. They receive portions of their pensions from the various countries where they were employed and paid pension contributions, and thus far, the minimum pension rule has not applied to them. According to previous data from the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund, around three and a half thousand proportional pensioners currently receive a cumulative pension total of less than 450 euros, making them eligible for this additional compensation.

Pension beneficiaries who receive part of their pension in Montenegro do so not according to the Law on Pension and Disability Insurance, since they lack full working experience within Montenegro; rather, they receive their pensions based on interstate agreements established by Montenegro with those other countries. This has resulted in their inability to access rights under the minimum pension regulations until now.

The proposed amendments indicate that insured individuals who have earned a proportional pension under international agreements and are permanently residing in Montenegro are entitled to receive the difference up to the minimum pension amount if the total of their pension—when adjusted according to the applicable exchange rate on the date of their application—is less than the minimum pension amount.

The government’s rationale for this proposal is to enhance the socio-economic conditions of proportional pension beneficiaries. It further calculates that implementing these increased benefits will require approximately 5.5 million euros annually, a figure allocated in the 2025 budget proposal currently being examined by Parliament.

False Information in Applications May Lead to Criminal Charges

The Pension and Disability Insurance Fund has unofficially informed “Vijesti” that beneficiaries must disclose in their application where they receive their pensions and in what amounts, providing proof through certificates from other pension funds.

This request and accompanying documentation will be regarded as official documents, meaning any provision of false information could result in potential criminal liability.

Theoretically, a beneficiary collecting pensions from multiple countries, alongside their Montenegrin pension, could conceal some income to receive a higher benefit amount.

To counteract such scenarios, the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund will seek to include clauses in agreements with other countries mandating the electronic exchange of pension income data, which was not previously in place.

The bill on the Assembly’s agenda specifies that payments to adjust to the minimum pension amount “will be made from the first day of the following month after the application is submitted,” highlighting that it is in the interest of beneficiaries to submit their applications promptly once the process commences.

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