By Alex Watkins
THE BRITISH Foreign and Commonwealth Office has now updated its website regarding ‘life’ certificates which were being sent to random expat pensioners requiring them to prove they had not died to continue receiving their pension.
The requirement was recently stopped for pensioners resident in Spain after David Burrage of the now-defunct British Expats Association took the matter up with the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in 2009 because a local woman’s payments were stopped, even though she had never received the letter to return it.
“Whilst I have been successful when pointing out to the DWP that Community law demands proper exchanges and cooperation between the member states, regrettably ‘Life’ certificates will continue to be sent out to pensioners resident in each of the other EEA [European Economic Area] countries and Switzerland,” he told Costa News.