DIVORCING spouses - even amicable ones - should be warned that adjusting the pension rights of the two partners as part of the divorce settlement is automatically going to entail significant costs.

In a recent address to the Irish Association of Pension Funds seminar in Dublin, Mr Ultan Stephenson, a partner in the legal firm McCann Fitzgerald, said that adjustment is not possible without an order from the courts, even if the spouses are in full agreement. While the spouses have the right to information on the pension scheme, said Mr Stephenson, they may be asked to pay the costs of compiling the information. If the spouses proceed to get a pension adjustment order they will also have to pay the costs of administering it.

It is the responsibility of pension scheme trustees to provide the necessary information about the pension to the divorcing partners and Mr Stephenson recommends that trustees should not take sides but rather recommend that the couples seek independent, specialist advice when seeking to divide the pension benefits.

Specialist actuarial firms are being set up for this purpose, and while the cost of paying for the trustee and actuarial services may be discouraging, in many cases it will be more than justified by the actual value of those pension rights.