JPMorgan Chase Denies Pension to Employee's Widow for Lack of 'Required Documents'

Melvyn Silverberg, who worked as a systems analyst at Chase Manhattan Bank for ten years until 1979. Nine years later he died unexpectedly at the age of 43 as a result of multiple organ failure.

After her own retirement in 2011, Elaine Silverberg, his widow, attempted to reclaim her late husband's pension from JPMorgan Chase, which was renamed Chase Manhattan Bank after its merger with JPMorgan in 2000, where her husband worked. JPMorgan Chase has denied benefits from her husband's $53,000 retirement plan, which has remained untouched for more than 35 years. Social Security Administration officials estimate the unused account is worth $331 a month.

“You would think the bank would want to do the right thing,” Silverberg told the New York Post. JPMorgan Chase admits that Melvyn received a vested retirement benefit before he left the bank, but he failed to fill out a form electing her for an annuity after his death, the bank said.

In 1984, the Retirement Equity Act was passed, amending the Employee Retirement Income Security Act in response to concerns that women were not receiving their fair share of private retirement benefits. However, because Melvyn left Chase before the law changed and did not complete the required paperwork before his death, the bank argues that his widow is not entitled to the pension.

“While we sympathize with Ms. Silverberg, she is asking us to pay without the required documentation,” a JPMorgan spokesman said. “We adhere to the terms of our pension plan, which do not allow for individual exceptions.” However, Elaine told the Post that none of the three letters ever arrived.

Elaine, who lives in New Jersey, even hired New Jersey Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Eliot Engel, a former congressman from New York, to try to convince JP Morgan to abandon its tough stance on Mel's pension funds , but without success.

Elaine, who retired from her job as administrator of the New York State Assembly in Albany in 2011, added that she could not afford to hire top-notch lawyers to take on one of the world's most powerful financial institutions. “That’s a lot of money for me. To them it’s just a joke,” Silverberg said.