You will receive the form for the certificate of life every year together with your pension adjustment notification if you, as a beneficiary of a Germany pension,
- live abroad
- live in Germany and have a bank account abroad
These will be machine-generated and sent in the period from June to July 2025.
Digital proof of life is also available. If you should use this procedure and have already successfully carried it out, you no longer have to additionally submit the certificate of life form by mail. All necessary documents (including the cover letter for digital proof of life) are enclosed in your pension adjustment notification.
If you receive more than one pension, more than one proof of life may be needed. In this case, several forms with different postal service payroll numbers and postal service pension numbers for the 2025 certificate of life or several 2025 digital proof of life letters will be sent to you together with your pension adjustment notification.
Please provide all required proofs of life. To do this, you can either
- complete all forms for the 2025 certificate of life, have them confirmed by an authorized institution, and return the originals by mail
or
- provide the 2025 digital proof of life for each pension
Important note: Paper-based certificates of life may not be returned by e-mail or fax.
In the event you have received a pension adjustment notification without a certificate of life form or without the letter regarding the digital proof of life, you are not required to submit a certificate of life this year. No further action is required on your part.
Note:
A certificate of life generally is not required in the following countries, with which we are electronically networked: Austria, Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Proof of life may nonetheless be required in some cases. In that case, you will receive all necessary documents together with your pension adjustment notification.
a) The certificate of life is sent to you by mail
Please sign the certificate of life yourself in Section A2 and have it confirmed in Section B by an authorized institution.
The following institutions are regularly authorized for certification:
- All public authorities such as police or municipalities (registration offices, mayor’s offices)
- German representatives abroad (embassies, consulates)
- Financial institutions
- Health insurance providers
- Hospitals
- Notaries
- Parish offices
- Polyclinics
- Rabbinates
- Pension insurance providers
- Red Cross
- In addition, you will find country-specific institutions that are also authorized at www.rentenservice.de/LB/FAQ.
Please also review the information in Section A1, where you will find your personal data. If this data is correct, you do not need to take any further action in this section. If it is no longer correct, please provide us with the correct data in the appropriate field.
Then please return the original by mail to the following address (use the return envelope enclosed in your pension adjustment notification for this purpose):
- Deutsche Post AG
- Niederlassung Renten Service
- 04078 Leipzig
- Germany
A confirmed certificate of life is a prerequisite for continuing to receive your German pension. Payment of your pension will be suspended if we have not received the form by October 17, 2025.
b) You have not received the pension adjustment notification by August 2025
If you have not received your pension adjustment notification by August 4, 2025, please contact Renten Service (you will find the specific contact details at the end of this information) or your responsible pension insurance provider to inquire whether a certificate of life is required this year. If you have confirmation that a certificate of life is required this year, you can find the appropriate form on our website: www.rentenservice.de/LB/Formblatt.
Please complete the certificate of life, sign it personally, and have it confirmed by an authorized institution.
The following institutions are regularly authorized for certification:
- All public authorities such as police or municipalities (registration offices, mayor’s offices)
- German representatives abroad (embassies, consulates)
- Financial institutions
- Health insurance providers
- Hospitals
- Notaries
- Parish offices
- Polyclinics
- Rabbinates
- Pension insurance providers
- Red Cross
- In addition, you will find country-specific institutions that are also authorized at www.rentenservice.de/LB/FAQ.
Please then return the original by mail to the following address:
- Deutsche Post AG
- Niederlassung Renten Service
- 04078 Leipzig
- Germany
A confirmed certificate of life is a prerequisite for continuing to receive your German pension. Payment of your pension will be suspended if we have not received the form by October 17, 2025.
c) The pension beneficiary is unable to write
In the event that the pension beneficiary is unable to write, confirmation of this fact must be provided in Section C1 of the certificate of life.
d) The pension beneficiary is unable to visit an authorized institution in person
If the pension beneficiary is unable to visit an authorized institution in person, confirmation of this fact must be provided in Section C1 of the certificate of life. Additionally, the name of the person who visited the authorized institution on behalf of the pension beneficiary must be given in Section C2.
e) The pension beneficiary is deceased
We are very sorry that you have lost a loved one and do not wish to cause you any more inconvenience than necessary.
If you or the funeral directors have already notified us that the person entitled to the pension has died, then your notification and our dispatch of the adjustment, including the request for the annual proof of life, have overlapped. You do not need to do anything else. If this is not the case, please complete the “Change Notification: Certificate of Life” or fill out Section C3 “Notification of Renten Service upon the death of the pension beneficiary” and send it to:
- For pensioners who reside in Germany
- Deutsche Post AG
- Niederlassung Renten Service
- 13497 Berlin, Germany
- For pensioners who do not reside in Germany
- Deutsche Post AG
- Niederlassung Renten Service
- 13496 Berlin, Germany
You will find the form here: Change Notification.