Submission of application

The application for a pension shall be filed by the citizen himself, at any DSSA, in Prague at any local PSSA branch. The pension application shall be filed in person or another person may be authorized to do so under a power-of-attorney (no official authentication is required). The application shall be drawn up jointly by a staff member of the pension insurance department and the applicant. The application for the old-age pension may be filed no sooner than four months before the required date of the pension award. At a later date, this can be done at any time. However, early retirement pensions cannot be granted retrospectively, and no sooner than from the date of application.

Pension applications may also be filed retrospectively. The payment shall be granted from the date on which the entitlement was acquired and the outstanding pension payments shall be paid off. The limit for the payment of the pension shall be 5 years retrospectively, after this period the entitlement to payment of individual instalments will be forfeited.

The persons living in another EU member state or in a state with which the Czech Republic has concluded a bilateral social security agreement shall, as a general rule, apply for the Czech pension in their state of residence through the local pension insurance institution. The latter will then forward it to CSSA.

Required documents and forms

• ID card, i.e. identity card, passport or residence permit are required,

• evidence of the length of studies (or vocational training), even if it has not been completed

  • certificate of apprenticeship;
  • certificate from individual years and A-levels equivalent certificate;
  • study report (student’s book), state final exam certificate, diploma;

• confirmation of the school regarding the length of studies (the level of education does not directly affect the entitlement to pension, it is affected by the length of studies; therefore, therefore the supporting documents evidencing such fact must be submitted)

• evidence of military service time
  • soldier’s book,
  • confirmation of the Administrative archive of the Czech Army (located at: Nám. Republiky 4, Olomouc),

• documents proving the raising of children or care of children

  • birth certificates of children or extracts from birth registers or other documents of placement of children into care (e.g. judgement of court granting adoption or custody of a child), unless the above can be verified by DSSA in the records of citizens

• evidence of insurance periods or periods treated as periods of insurance (e.g. periods for which the citizen was registered with the labour office, periods of care for a person dependant on the care of another person, etc.) that are not included in the pension insurance's informative personal record or of whom the applicant knows that they are not kept in the records of CSSA