Unpaid Membership Dues

Relief associations cannot deduct unpaid membership dues directly from a member’s service pension.  Minnesota law prohibits a member from assigning his or her service pension and prohibits a relief association from paying any amount that has been so assigned.  In addition, except for certain payments related to child support and marriage dissolution, a member’s service pension is not subject to garnishment, judgement, execution, or other legal process. 

In other words, even if a member consents to the deduction, a relief association cannot directly deduct unpaid membership dues from a service pension.  Even if a legal document states that unpaid membership dues (not payments related to child support and marriage dissolution) may be deducted from a service pension, a relief association does not have the authority to do so.

Published last in the April 2019 Pension Newsletter