Ukrainian pensioners whose payments are cut after a recalculation can challenge the decision through the courts, according to Olha Khomych, a lawyer at the Ivan Khomych Law Office, who spoke to RBC-Ukraine.
Khomych said the law "On Compulsory State Pension Insurance" governs how pensions are recalculated, covering annual indexation and adjustments made for new work experience or earnings gained after a pension has already been granted. These are factors, she said, that are meant only to increase a pension. She said the relevant article contains no mechanism at all for reducing a pension that has already been assigned.
Military pensions handled differently
For military pensions, the issue has already been settled in law. Article 63 of the law "On Pension Provision for Persons Discharged from Military Service" states that if a recalculation would produce a lower figure, the pensioner keeps the amount previously granted.
No equivalent safeguard exists for the general pension system, Khomych said, so the matter is effectively left to court practice. She said the right to receive a pension at an already determined amount is protected as a person's property interest, and that it makes no difference what the Pension Fund of Ukraine calls its action, whether recalculation, clarification or bringing a payment into compliance.
Courts have sided with pensioners
Where a recalculation results in a lower payment, Khomych said courts treat it as an unlawful revision of a previously granted pension rather than a legitimate recalculation. She noted that the law gives pensioners no way to simply refuse a recalculation, since no such mechanism exists, so she advised challenging the specific decision issued by the Pension Fund of Ukraine instead.
She said pensioners can first lodge a complaint with the fund's higher management body, and if that fails, take the case to an administrative court demanding that the previous pension amount be restored, that the difference be paid for the entire period affected, and that compensation be added for the delay.
Khomych said courts back the pensioner in the large majority of these cases. The exception, she said, is when the reduction is not the result of a new calculation methodology but stems from a corrected error or fraud discovered in how the pension was originally granted.
Other pension warnings for Ukrainians
Lawyer Yevgenia Bulymenko has separately said some Ukrainians risk losing part of their social guarantees, including their pension, if their employer fails to pay the unified social contribution on their behalf.
Maryna Kamilova, a lawyer at the Vinner Partners law firm, has also said that having an insurance record in Ukraine does not by itself guarantee a pensioner can keep receiving a pension after moving abroad. In some cases, she said, the Pension Fund of Ukraine can refuse to grant or recalculate payments, or cancel a pension that had already been assigned.
