Will die earlier than retirement

Older people from the "new regions" should now pay a pension in Russia. But it is almost impossible to get it

According to official figures, about 700 thousand people live in the territories of Ukraine annexed by Russia in 2022, to whom the state should pay a pension. As the “cold” found out, in practice it turns out that it is very difficult to receive this pension: because of absurd bureaucratic requirements and red tape, people have been waiting for the pension for months-and in the end they still refuse to many. Elderly refugees receive an order of magnitude less from Russia than they received from Ukraine; Many have to get a job, despite health problems and dozens of work experience, or take loans.

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All the names of the heroes and some details of their stories in this material are changed at their request. “Cold” got acquainted with the documents in question in the text, and confirmed their authenticity.

"People are waiting and you are waiting"

Valentina Ivanovna and Sergey Petrovich remained in Bakhmut, when there were practically no civilians there. The city was almost erased from the face of the earth, the battles walked on the streets for months, and two elderly people who lived together all their lives did not want to throw their house.

“We left when everything was already burning,” recalls 68-year-old Valentina Ivanovna. - We stayed until the last. They thought it would make and end. ”

Valentina Ivanovna sits in a small room of the temporary placement of refugees in the Moscow region. On the hanger - two wiped coats, a green furry sweater with several small holes on the sleeve hangs on the chair - apparently from moths. Here Valentina Ivanovna and her 67-year-old husband have been living for the past few months: they left from their hometown only at the end of 2022-after Sergey suffered a stroke and it became difficult for him to walk.

Valentina Ivanovna and her husband retired several years ago - it was she who provided their life in Ukraine. Arriving in the Moscow region, they rented an apartment for a month for their small savings and submitted documents to start a Russian pension: a passport, an original work book, SNILS (a list of documents necessary for submitting an application may vary depending on the type of employment, but these three are almost always needed ).

“We thought: well, we’ll wait a month, and there will be a pension,” says Valentina Ivanovna. - After a month, we had nothing to pay [for the apartment]. And then we were told in the Pension Fund: “People have been waiting for their appointment for seven months. And you are waiting.”

To find their own housing, they had to call the hotline of the Governor of the Moscow Region and ask them to be given a room at a temporary accommodation point. Now they were waiting for their pension here. The apartment rented by Valentina and Sergey was in the city, and the temporary placement point (PVR) was in the forest in the next area: in order to begin to consider the pension case, it should first be transferred from one branch of the Pension Fund to another.

I had to wait for this for several months. “Every Wednesday comes to us in the PVR from a pension fund,” says Valentina. - For three months I approached her and asked what with our pensions. She answered me only: "Wait."

As a result, the 68-year-old pensioner herself went to take documents to another city, brought to the PVR and gave the fund to the employee. Only after that, Valentine was assigned a monthly payment from the state in the amount of 11,668 rubles. The documents that Valentina Ivanovna were issued in the Pension Fund indicate that this is an old-age insurance pension, taking into account her experience-in Soviet times he and her husband went to work together at the construction site of the Baikal-Amur highway, then Valentina Ivanovna worked for many years in her hometown. Its total work experience is 30 years. An elderly people who have much less experience receive a pension of the same order.

Valentina Ivanovna's husband worked 41 years. First - on the radio node in Bakhmut (then it was called Artemov), and then - a private entrepreneur. Sergei Petrovich was appointed a pension of 11228 rubles.

The cost of living in the Moscow region in 2024 is 15735 rubles. (The pension may be lower than the subsistence minimum if the pensioner receives other benefits - for example, uses the right to travel free by transport.) Why spouses appoint such a small payment, despite the high experience, they do not explain in the Pension Fund.

Legislation related to pensions paid to residents of annexed territories is changing on the go. At first, when calculating these payments, only work experience was taken into account until 2002. In March 2023, the law entered into force, which allows you to take into account all the length of service, however, in order for this to happen, the applicants need to submit a lot of additional documents. But Valentina Ivanovna submitted her documents in the summer of 2023 - after the adoption of the law.

“In Soviet times, we worked for more years than in Ukraine - even if they do not consider Ukrainian experience, we still have to have a pension,” Valentina Ivanovna is perplexed. - In Ukraine, I had a pension of 7785 hryvnias. Much more. ( At the rate of 2021, approximately 21 thousand rubles. - Approx. “Cold.” ) And a woman from the pension fund does not explain anything. He says: “They gave you a piece of paper, everything is written there.” But I don't understand what is written there. ”

On the piece of paper that Valentine was given literally the following is written: "DDD accounting 0014, there are no 14 workers, no, no." "Cold" failed to decipher this message.

Now Valentina Ivanovna is trying to arrange a disability for her husband - without her, a third of the manual is spent only on medicines that can be issued for people with disabilities for free. A free bus from the PVR in the PVR forest goes to the clinic once a week and is waiting only an hour, which is not always enough to get to the doctor. Therefore, an elderly woman travels by taxi to issue the necessary certificates for her husband - to pay for him, she took a loan.

Six more retirement age from the annexed regions of Ukraine told similar stories of the Cold. Four, like Valentina and her husband, now live in the PVR in the Moscow region, two remain in the “attached” territories, but the scripts are similar: first, the appointment of pensions is delayed, explaining this by the fact that the “case” is sent from one branch of the Pension Fund to another, then they ask to convey the documents, then, after a few months, they are assigned a payment that does not take into account full experience.

The reasons for this decision may be different. Someone has a bad press, someone lacks a signature, someone has not been registered with a year of birth. In all cases, these are mistakes in documents that do not affect their common meaning - and which cannot be corrected in war conditions.

"Girl, no more city"

75-year-old Ivan Sergeyevich lived in Bakhmut all his life and worked as a miner for several decades. After the war began, in May 2022 he survived a heart attack - and in December he went to live with his son in Samara.

Miners in Ukraine can retire before others - such an opportunity is provided for people who have a particularly difficult or harmful work for health. There is a similar list of professions in Russia, and in many ways it coincides with the Ukrainian one. However, when Ivan Sergeyevich submitted documents in the summer of 2023 to receive a preferential mining pension in Russia, he demanded confirmation of experience.

It turned out that the work book is not enough. In the case when people are entitled to a preferential experience, the Pension Fund in addition to the usual package of documents require confirmation of the length of service. According to the law, the employer should be issued, but enterprises where people living in the east of Ukraine worked is often simply no longer: they are destroyed as a result of hostilities.

“The girl said that they would make a request for confirming documents to the city of Artemovsk,” says Ivan Sergeevich. - I explain to her: “Girl! No more the city of Artemovsk. He was simply demolished. There are no services there.” ”

At first, the former Shakhtar - just like Valentina Sergeevna - was appointed a minimum pension that does not take into account his full work experience (in Samara its size is even less than 10 thousand rubles), but after some time the pension fund officers suggested a decision: to issue a full preferential pension in Shakhtersk, the city in the territory of the self -proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic.

In the hope of getting a allowance that allows you to survive, Ivan Sergeyevich moved again. He had nowhere to live in Shakhtersk - for six months he lives at a temporary accommodation point in the former hospital. The payment appointed in the Volga region was ceased to be charged after moving, they also did not appoint a pension due to bureaucratic red tape. His case was sent from Samara to Shakhtersk, but it should go to the branch of the Pension Fund for Artemovsk. It is located exactly in the same building where the department is Shakhtersk - but in another room.

“I tell them, but it came to you! - says Ivan Sergeevich. - Just transfer it from the office to the office. No, not supposed. It should come from Samara. And how much it will go and whether it will come at all is unknown. ” He tried to apply for financial assistance, but he was also refused an interview: they said that their family’s pensions were not supposed to be enough and did not suppose material assistance. (The wife of Ivan Sergeevich was easier to get her pension in Russia, since she has no preferential experience.)

According to the Social Fund of the Russian Federation (since 2023, the Pension Fund of Russia has been included in this new structure), at the end of 2022, 41.8 million people received pension payments in Russia - almost a third of the total population of the country (at the same time, the annexed regions of Ukraine are not included). About 70% of these funds arise from pension contributions of citizens (working “feed” current pensioners), the rest is covered by the federal budget. The social fund predicted that taking into account the four “new regions” by 2024, pensioners will become 1.6 million more - moreover, the tax deductions of working in the annexed regions of Ukraine do not cover the pensions of those who live there. The amount that the state must transfer from the federal budget for the payment of pensions is growing after the start of the war every year.

“It seems to me that the problem is in my underground experience,” says Ivan Sergeyevich. - My pension will cost the state about 25 thousand. And so they don’t have to pay anything. ”

In January 2023, an interdepartmental commission was created, which should solve problems with the appointment of pensions to residents of the occupied territories. There is no reporting on the work of this commission; “Cold” is unknown in cases when it would help in confirmation of the preferential experience or resolving other issues.

"Closure"

People who retire are also faced with refusals - after the start of the war, the annexation of their regions and obtaining a Russian passport.

55-year-old Diana Vladimirovna worked for 36 years as a crane operator and operator control of the control in the hot workshop at the Ilyich metallurgical plant in Mariupol. This is one of the professions that are included in the list of preferential pension experience, but Diana demanded a certificate of confirmation of the experience that had to be received through the Pension Fund of Ukraine in the DPR Pension Fund.

According to her, she managed to get this certificate. “I ordered her through a lawyer in Lviv,” says Diana Vladimirovna. - The closure of labor with a wet seal, a certificate of earnings five years before 2002 - I provided all the documents that they [in the Donetsk Pension Fund] demanded. But just a certificate confirming the preferential experience issued in Ukraine, they consider invalid. Where else should I get her? Some kind of vicious circle. "

Having received a refusal, Diana Vladimirovna went to court. She says that she lost in the first instance and in the second, but in the end she won the appeal. It took four months. As a result, she was still a pension-in the amount of 10 thousand rubles: this is the minimum amount of pension in the territory of the DPR. In October 2023, Diana Vladimirovna submitted documents for recalculating pensions under Russian legislation: after the “accession” of the self -proclaimed republics to Russia, they switch to the laws of the Russian Federation, but this process is long and difficult. Diana Vladimirovna constantly checked the "State Services", but found out that she was refused only when she called the hotline. She received a refusal on the basis that all Ukrainian certificates issued after 2022 are invalid.

“Cold” sent a request to the social fund of Russia to clarify why this is happening, and find out how the interagency commission copes with the solution to the accrual of pensions. At the time of publication of the material, there was no response to this request.

“For those who first retire, and even on preferential experience, getting a pension is a huge problem,” continues Diana Vladimirovna. - A lot of acquaintances who simply do not know what to do. I had all the documents, and they refused me. And for many people, some of the documents burned down. ”

This is what happened to 59-year-old Elena Mikhailovna, who had lived in Mariupol all his life. Her house was destroyed during the war, her husband died, a work book and other documents burned. She herself now lives in a hostel in Samara, in a small room, which for her in a mortgage she bought a daughter. Like Diana Vladimirovna, Elena Mikhailovna worked for many years in a hot workshop - at Azovstali . In the Russian pension, Elena Mikhailovna was refused - and even to find out about this refusal, she had to go to the Pension Fund herself.

“I have to prove my experience,” says Elena Mikhailovna. - And how can I prove, if my house burned out, I burned documents, killed my husband, all relatives died? They say that you need to bring a witness to Mariupol, who will confirm my work at Azovstali. I can find such a person, of course. But for me now it is unrealistic to go to Mariupol. I just have no money. We need money for the road and for life there - there are also queues there. Walking, seeking, asking is not one day. ”

To make what to live on, Diana Vladimirovna, who has worked for more than a dozen years at the factory, now works as a cleaner and a saleswoman. This is far from an isolated case: older people who lost their houses and property, often, having been in a new place without any social ties, are forced to look for work again, and it can be very difficult to find it.

“Old, sick, they are arranged by guards, dishwashers, cleaners,” says Svetlana Sergeevna. She worked for 35 years at one of the Bakhmut factories; Now Svetlana Sergeevna and her husband live at a temporary accommodation point in Shakhtersk. Despite the working experience at 35, she was charged a pension in the amount of 12437 rubles per month. “There are those who just die in this work,” she continues. - heart attacks, strokes. Many in such apathy, so desperate. They say: “We will die before we wait for pensions. It would be better if we died there during shelling.”