the former Pôle emploi demanded 17,000 euros from him after a glitch with retirement insurance

Many job seekers fear this mail. On October 3, Jeanne*, almost 65 years old, received a notification of overpayment from France Travail (formerly Pôle emploi). The amount then claimed from him? No less than 17,358.16 euros. And this, under the specific solidarity allowance (ASS) which she received, wrongly according to the public employment operator, between October 2021 and May 2024. Our witness was in fact a victim of communication bug between France Travail and Pension Insurancehighlighted by the national mediator of the former Pôle emploi in his latest annual report, published in April 2024. Due to poor transmission of information between the two institutions, many seniors were thus compensated for several years by France Travail, when they should have received a retirement pension.

Jeanne is one of these job seekers. When she applies for her pension in 2021, the Pension Insurance notifies her (wrongly) that she does not total “only 136 quarters of insurance as of February 1” of the same year and that it must “submit a new application four months before February 1, 2026, the date on which (she will be) entitled to the maximum rate”. Convinced that she had to wait another 5 years before being able to benefit from a retirement pension, Jeanne, having reached the end of her rights to classic unemployment benefittherefore continued to request every 6 months to benefit from 560 euros of ASS from France Travail, this benefit being renewable every six months if the job seeker still meets the required conditions.

An overpayment reduced to 2,000 euros by France Travail

Contacted, the National Old Age Insurance Fund considers that it “seems to have been a repeated “error” by the insured” because it would not have provided the elements allowing the quarterly increases for children to be taken into account. “It is therefore up to France Travail to assess the situation but on the Carsat side (retirement and occupational health insurance funds, Editor’s note), no recourse is possible, the file was handled according to the rules of the art”continues the Cnav. However, Jeanne assures us: “I provided everything on time and I have all the elements stipulating from 2021 that my file was complete. I still see that those concerned are passing the buck”she laments. Because initially, the former employment center also refused to cancel our witness's debt, blaming the Pension Insurance.

But ultimately, after calling on a mediator from France Travail and following an intervention on our part, the public employment operator granted Jeanne a partial debt forgiveness. From now on, she owes “only” 2,249.81 euros to France Travail. A sum which corresponds to the specific solidarity allowance that she received each month between last February and May while, at the same time, she was (finally) able to benefit from a pension. On June 18, 2024, Retirement Insurance notified him by mail that“after study of his file”she was finally entitled to a pension since February 1 of this year, as well as an increase for children, for a total of just over 1,000 euros net (before income tax) per month.

If Jeanne's case seems to be settled, our witness is not giving up. “When I think that I received only 560 euros from ASS every month instead of a little more than 1,000 euros in retirement, I am revolted. We walk on our heads”she thunders. And the sixty-year-old is far from the only one to have been a victim of this bug. As reported Capital end of Septembera resident of Eure was also asked for a reimbursement of more than 15,000 euros by France Travail because of the dysfunction in communication with Retirement Insurance, before seeing her debt erased.

The procedure to follow for seniors victims of the bug between France Travail and Retirement Insurance

In total, more than 150,000 files had to be re-examined by the former Pôle emploi, giving rise to the notification of 2,500 overpayments, according to data that the institution communicated to us at the beginning of August. Following an analysis shared between Carsat and France Travail, “we concluded that in approximately 5% of affected cases, there was indeed a Carsat errortells us the Cnav. In these specific cases, and very rare, we have made recommendations of kindness”. If you are in this situation, you must file “an appeal before the Retirement Insurance which a commission will take up to record retroactivity in terms of allocation of the pension”specifies the general management of France Travail to Capital. In this specific case, you must then notify the employment operator so that they suspend any procedure on their part, pending the decision of the Retirement Insurance appeals committee.

If it is an error from France Travail, you can directly contact the joint body attached to your agency “by requesting debt forgiveness”continues the institution. And to add that in this situation, “many cases of debt forgiveness have been recorded”. Senior victims of the bug are therefore not not always obliged to repay their wrongly received unemployment benefits.

And to avoid errors for future unemployed people close to retirement, France Travail, Retirement Insurance and Unédic, the organization responsible for managing the unemployment insurance system, announced the launch of a new online service in mid-July. “This new pathway, which will be implemented at the start of 2025, allows us to better support beneficiaries and make them aware of the mandatory nature of procedures with their pension fund”reports the general management of France Travail.