QDRO's and the PBGC

[Guest Ms Behave]

I have been involved in a protracted dispute with my former spouse (which he initiated). I am the AP of a defined benefit pension plan which is currently administered by the PBGC. Although the employees of the PBGC are friendly and seem to be helpful, it is very difficult to receive satisfactory answers (in my opinion). The PP was upset by the reduction of his benefit by the PBGC when they took over the plan and filed an action against me in the court system (as my "fixed-dollar" benefit remained unchanged and he was requesting that I share proportionally in the reduction he took).

After many months, a long court hearing and costly attorneys fees, in February the PBGC sent me a copy of a letter addressed to my former spouse saying they had "completed its review of the draft domestic relations order you submitted" (unilaterally and no copy provided to me or my attorney) and said that "it would NOT (the PBGC added the emphasis) be a qualified domestic relations order . . . . for the follow reason(s):

If payments have already started under a QDRO providing the alternate payee a separate interest, no change to the QDRO is permitted.

The court was provided with a copy of this PBGC letter, but the judge made no reference to it in his decision/order in which he denied both my former spouse's motion and my motion for costs and fees.

My question is: Why wasn't that information available - possibly printed on the DOL or PBGC website, so that all of this was clearly unnecessary? I have searched and have never been able to find anything addressing this issue. When I called the PBGC early on and explained I had been in pay status for nearly two decades, I was never told that, under my circumstances, no change would be permitted.

Any insight on this would be appreciated - or I would especially appreciate being directed to any writing which states this policy (maybe I wasn't using the correct key words in my searches).

The award to me was a property settlement in a divorce; but my former spouse is a very tenacious opponent and will continue to beat a dead horse. I'm assuming he will file a motion for reconsideration with the court and was hoping to be able to find something more concrete about this issue. Also, the PBGC gave no instructions in their letter concerning the appeal process, so I'm hoping it means that this isn't open to appeal (which would give him the opportunity to drag this thing on even longer).