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thedrifter
08-25-06, 03:44 PM
August 25, 2006
Deceased ex-spouses still get paid, probe reveals

By Rick Maze
Staff writer

An investigation sparked by complaints from divorced military retirees has found that the Pentagon occasionally continues to pay a share of a service member’s retired pay to an ex-spouse who has died.

Investigators for the Pentagon inspector general found 14 instances when retired pay was not terminated after an ex-spouse’s death — a small amount considering that more than 77,800 former spouses receive a portion of military retired pay, investigators said in a report to Congress.


The investigation specifically looked at what the Defense Finance and Accounting Service does after the death of an ex-spouse who was receiving a portion of a member’s military retired pay under court order.

Under the Uniformed Services Former Spouses Protection Act, DFAS can be order to pay up to 50 percent of a retiree’s after-tax retired pay directly to a former spouse as part of a divorce settlement under certain circumstances.

But when either the spouse or retiree dies, the payments end — or they’re supposed to.

“DFAS paid military retirement benefits to the accounts of deceased former military spouses less than 1 percent of the time,” the report says.

The 14 instances were found over a six-year span. In one case, the former spouse was alive, although the Social Security Administration listed her as deceased.

A review was requested because of complaints about slow processing that prevents retirees from having their full retired pay restored after the death of a former spouse.

“We identified no material management control weaknesses in the payment of military retirement benefits to former military spouses,” the report says.

DFAS sometimes receives unconfirmed death notices from a former spouse’s family members, friends, or banks, the report says. Returned mail may also lead DFAS to suspect that a former military spouse has died.

“Once DFAS receives a confirmed death notice in the form of a death certificate, newspaper clipping, or a notarized letter from the former spouse’s estate, it proceeds to terminate the account immediately and return any overpayments to the retiree.”

DFAS is working on plans for monthly comparisons of the list of former spouses against Social Security files to check on deaths, the report says.

The review uncovered other problems, the report says, noting 205 instances when names did not match Social Security numbers. About half of these problems were the result of typing errors, the report says.

In other cases, a former spouse may have changed names but not their records, although some cases remain under review.

Ellie