Chapter 1. Observing social rights Including the period of work, for which no insurance social security contribution has been paid due to a fault of employer into the person’s length of service insurance and calculating the amount of his/ her pension remains unresolved at the legislative level. The problem of arrears of payment of insurance premiums on liquidated enterprises without determining the successor is critical. According to the PFU, 9,679 enterprises that were liquidated without a successor have arrears of payment of compulsory state pension insurance and a single compulsory social insurance. As a result, 383,152 persons have lost their length of service insurance (See Annex 1.2). Example Due to the arrears of Odesa production chemical-pharmaceutical enterprise “Biostimulator” on payment of insurance premium for compulsory state pension insurance for the period from November 2006 to September 2010, the rights of 1,025 employees of the enterprise in the field of compulsory state social insurance were violated, as 33 months of work were not included into their length of service insurance. The citizens’ rights in the above case are renewed by the courts. The position of the courts is that the arrears of the enterprise on insurance premiums cannot be a reason for not counting the respective periods of work to a person’s insurance length of service when calculating the pension1. However, when executing such court decisions, the PFU bodies in the calculation of pensions account that the salary for the missed period was zero, which leads to unjustified decrease in the amount of pension. Late awarding/recalculation of a pension The Commissioner received reports of violations by the PFU bodies of the citizens’ right to timely award/ recalculation of pensions. The respective facts were confirmed during the consideration of the appeals. Example In January 2019, the Commissioner was addressed by citizen D. from Donetsk oblast who reported that he had been receiving a reduced pension since 01.10.2018, as the PFU territorial body does not recalculates his pension although a person received a more severe disability group. The PFU continues paying the reduced pension which violates his right to adequate retirement benefits. At the request of the Commissioner to the Main Department of the PFU in Donetsk oblast, only in March 2019 the right of citizen D. to receive his due pension was renewed from the date of establishment of disability of a more severe group (10 October 2018, for five months). In addition, as the error in calculating the pension amount in the previous period was identified, additional amount of pension was awarded to him for the period from 01.04.2018 (for 11 months). 1 Resolutions of the Supreme Court of 24 May 2018 in case #490/12392/16-a, of 04 August 2018 in case #482/434/17, of 01 November 2018 in case #199/1852/15-a. 21 CHAPTER 1 The right to pension