Securing a Pension Sharing Order

A Pension Sharing Order is a legally binding document that outlines how pensions will be divided between divorcing spouses. It is necessary when one or both parties have pension assets that need to be shared as part of the financial settlement. This order ensures that the pension provider transfers the agreed portion of the pension to the other party, providing a clear and enforceable division. As well as pension division, our Pension Sharing Order Service also covers the sale and transfer of properties and provides both parties with clean break protection so that neither party can make a claim against the other in the future.

Our Fully Managed Pension Sharing Order Service costs £599. This fee includes the preparation and submission of all necessary documents, court communication, and the management of the entire process to ensure a smooth and efficient resolution.
There is also a court fee of £593 for the divorce and a consent order court fee of £60 that you will need to consider.

The process typically takes around 8 weeks – this is 4 weeks to draft and 4 weeks for the court to approve the Pension Sharing Order. If you opt for our Fast Track service, the Pension Sharing Order can be ready for court filing within four one weeks of receiving your application, and it takes the court on average 4 weeks to approve so total time from start to finish of 5 weeks

To proceed with a Pension Sharing Order, you will need to provide the following information which we captured through our online questionnaire:

• Total equity held in properties
• Total savings and investments
• Total liabilities (not mortgage debt)
• The total cash equivalent transfer value (CETV) of your pensions and fund name, address, account no. and CETV of any individual pensions that you plan to share
• Your and your spouses national insurance numbers and any other names either of you have been previously know as.
• Monthly income broken down into income from employment, benefits, child maintenance payments, pension or other sources.
• Any prior agreements or settlements made with your ex-partner and your planned financial settlement

You cannot get a consent order without disclosing this information.
You don’t need to provide bank statements, property valuations, or other evidence. However, if the court found that a party had been deliberately withholding information to deceive the other party or the court, the clean break order could be voided, and the perpetrator could face prosecution for fraud.

In most cases, you will not need to attend court. Our team handles all court submissions and communications on your behalf, ensuring the process is as smooth and stress-free as possible. You will only need to attend court if the court is not satisfied that your Pension Sharing Order is fair. If for example, after a 25 year marriage the pension split was very uneven, the court would question the fairness of the agreement.

No, you can’t. To get a Pension Sharing Order, you must have at least been given permission to divorce. This is known as a conditional order or a decree nisi under the old law. To get permission to divorce, you must have started divorce proceedings.

Yes, our service covers all types of pensions, including workplace pensions, private pensions, and state pensions. We ensure that each type is accurately valued and appropriately divided according to the terms of the consent order.

No, once a Pension Sharing Order has been finalised and approved by the court, it is legally binding and cannot be changed.

A Pension Sharing Order allows a couple to share pensions in the same way that they can split other assets such as houses and savings. The receiving party can become a member of the pension scheme or transfer the value to a new pension provider so that they become the legal owner of their share. By sharing the pension, both parties have access to financial resources for their future while achieving a financial clean break from each other.

No, it’s not possible to arrange pension sharing without applying for a Pension Sharing Order. Pension providers or pension schemes cannot transfer any pension without instruction from the court. This doesn’t mean you have to go to court – we deal with the courts on your behalf.

No, you need to make a separate application for a Pension Sharing Order. It is possible to get a divorce without a Pension Sharing Order, though this isn’t recommended because it puts your future financial wellbeing at risk.
Unless you buy a specific package that includes a divorce with a pension sharing, a consent order is never included in a fixed-fee divorce, it’s a separate service.

Pension sharing is optional, and due to a lack of awareness, many divorcing couples leave pensions out when they decide how to divide their money and property, which can be a huge mistake.

Research of 30,000 divorcing couples by the University of Manchester showed one partner has more than 90% of pension wealth in half of the couples studied. And fewer than 15% of couples have equal pensions.

Pensions have a considerable impact on people’s finances in later life, so it’s very important to ensure that you have adequate pension provision in place and consider pension when deciding on how you will split assets with your spouse.

Yes, there are two alternatives to a pension-sharing order:

Offsetting. This is where the value of the pension is offset against other assets. For example, one spouse keeps their entire pension while the other gets alternative assets of equal value (e.g. property or cash).

Pensions form part of the overall ‘matrimonial pot’, alongside other assets such as property, savings and other valuables. Whether it is the right choice to share pensions will depend on your circumstances.

A pension-sharing order might be a good choice if you are close to retirement age and you have very little in your pension pot.

However, pension sharing might lead to you having to share or dispose of other assets, such as the family home. So, a pension-sharing order might not be the best choice if retaining the family home to bring up your children is a priority.

In England and Wales, pension sharing can only take place by court order and only upon divorce or dissolution, so it’s available for unmarried couples.

A Pension Sharing Order cannot take effect until the divorce or dissolution procedure is finalised, and your final order (previously known as the decree absolute) is granted.

Once this happens, the pension provider has four months to implement the pension transfer.

Fees for implementing a Pension Sharing Order can be significant, and they are usually paid by the person sharing their pension funds. There is an option on the Pension Sharing Order to split the costs between both parties.

The pension provider should contact you with more information on the charges associated with pension transfer within 21 days of receiving the Pension Sharing Order.

You can only apply to the court to approve a Pension Sharing Order once you have started your divorce and reached the conditional order stage. Financial disclosure from you and your former spouse is needed to start the Pension Sharing Order process. It takes four weeks to draft your Pension Sharing Order for submission to the court. Ideally, you want to start the Pension Sharing Order process at least four weeks before your conditional order date to ensure that all documents are ready for signing so they can be submitted to the court when you receive your conditional order.

Yes, you do. A document known as a D81 Statement of Information must be completed and submitted to the court. This document shows your current financial position, and the court uses this information to decide if a consent order is fair.
The information needed is:

• Total equity held in properties
• Total savings and investments
• Total liabilities (not mortgage debt)
• The total value of pensions
• Monthly income broken down into income from employment, benefits, child maintenance payments, pension or other sources.

The court will not approve a consent order without this information.

No, you can’t. You must both agree, and your spouse must provide their financial information. We cannot apply for a Pension Sharing Order if your spouse is unwilling to provide financial disclosure or if they disagree with the financial settlement proposed.

Once you’ve both signed the statement of information and consent order and you have your conditional order, we can submit the consent order to the court for approval. An Easy Online Divorce drafted and submitted consent order typically takes around four weeks to approve.

The court fee for submitting a consent order is £60. However, you will need a solicitor to draft your Pension Sharing Order, and the cost of this will depend on whether you use Easy Online Divorce or a high street solicitor.

If you’ve called some local solicitors in your area, you’ll know that their costs can vary wildly from £2,000 for a Pension Sharing Order to £6,000, which can only be described (politely) as daylight robbery.

The good news is that Easy Online Divorce has transparent fixed prices. Our standard consent order, which includes a clean break, the sale or transfer of property, lump-sum payments, child and spousal maintenance and splitting savings and debt, is £599 including VAT.

Yes, they can, unless you have a consent order approved by the court to make it legally binding. Once approved, a consent order gives you clean break protection to prevent your ex from making future claims against you. If you don’t have a court-approved consent order, they can claim against you at any time in the future.

A Pension Sharing Order is a legally binding agreement approved by a judge. It orders (instructs) the pension scheme to carry out the transfer.

A separation agreement, on the other hand, is drafted by a solicitor and signed by both parties but is not legally binding. A pension provider cannot and will not share pensions from a separation agreement.

A separation agreement can be helpful for some couples, especially those who want help to set boundaries in the early days of separation, but be aware that the separation agreement does not prevent either party from changing their minds. Only a Pension Sharing Order sets your agreement in stone and forces a pension scheme to split or transfer a pension.

You can agree on the details of your Pension Sharing Order between yourselves through mediation or solicitor-led negotiation. If you can’t agree, you can ask the court to decide for you.

Deciding between yourselves is the least expensive option, but it does require openness and a willingness to cooperate. Meditation is a very effective way to reach an agreement for couples having difficulties. Although mediation is likely to cost somewhere in the region of £500, it is still less expensive than using a solicitor or going to court.

In some situations, a solicitor or court is needed. However, be aware that a court will expect you to have at least tried mediation. Solicitors are very useful in some situations but be mindful that their business model is to charge by the minute, usually in 15-minute blocks – this means there is a natural conflict of interest between making money for the firm and resolving issues quickly.

If you do have to go down a solicitor route, make sure that you are clear on what you want your outcome to be. If that is to resolve your divorce and finances quickly and as smoothly as possible, be cautious if your solicitor displays an overly aggressive approach to negotiation.

Except in rare circumstances, such as murder or gambling addiction, who was to blame for its breakdown does not affect the division of assets. Divorce and financial orders are two separate cases. And now, with the new no-fault divorce law, neither party has to blame the other. Instead, a statement is made that the marriage has irretrievably broken down.

One of the most confusing parts when applying for a no-fault divorce yourself is the page where it asks if you want a financial order. Titled ‘How to apply for a financial order’, it says you need to complete another form (Form A or Form A1) and pay the additional fee. This is misleading. A Form A (notice of intention to proceed with an application for a financial order) is for a couple in agreement, but if you are using an online service such as Easy Online Divorce that files directly into the court department’s systems, you don’t need to complete a Form A.

Similarly, if you have a contested financial agreement, you need to complete a Form A1 (notice of intention to proceed with an application for a financial remedy), but again, if you have to go down this route, you will need a solicitor to help you, and they will complete the form A1 for you.

No, the court doesn’t blindly approve Pension Sharing Orders, and they can question the fairness of your agreement. The consent order process is voluntary between a couple, so the court won’t force you to do something if they disagree with your order. But they will ask questions or ask you to consider certain agreements to ensure that a person in a weaker position is fully aware of the implications of the order.

In a divorce, a pension sharing order is a good idea if;

• One party holds a pension, which is of a significantly higher value than other available assets.
  
• You are approaching retirement age, making it difficult to save up comparable pension benefits on your own.
  
• Considering remarrying soon, it’s important to note that a pension sharing order is final and cannot be revised later.

Overall, pension sharing achieves a clean break and provides greater flexibility to you through the divorce. The court’s involvement and the service we provide also ensure a fair settlement of marital assets. Our team can explore alternative options to help you find the one most suited to your circumstances.

Form D81 (Statement of Information) is a required document in a divorce. It provides the court with a summary of both parties’ finances, including income, savings, property, and any debts. It allows the court to decide a fair pension sharing order between exes.

If the transferring party dies before a pension sharing order comes into effect, it becomes unenforceable against the pension scheme. If the Final order (decree absolute) has not been granted, the transferee may be entitled to the spouse’s benefits, depending on the scheme rules. However, if the transferring party dies after the divorce takes effect but before the pension sharing order is implemented, then the pension will still take place unless a successful application can be made to set that order aside. 

If this sounds applicable to your circumstances, it is essential to get legal advice.