NOXOLO MIYA
Johannesburg - Although couples vow to be together until death do them part when they marry, it's never a guarantee.
The 2019 Statistics SA report on marriages and divorces found that out of 129 597 civil marriages, 2 789 customary marriages, and 1 771 civil unions that were recorded that year, 23 710 ended in divorce.
The Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS) ranks getting a divorce as the second most stressful event in one’s life, and below are some of the reasons:
1. Your spouse can claim from your retirement funds:
According to the Divorce Act, divorcing couples can share in each other’s retirement benefits on the date of divorce to ensure a clean division of assets. This means that even though one spouse may choose to stay home and raise children, they can claim a share of the other spouse’s pension fund depending on how they are married.
The marital regime does, however, determine to what extent the non-member spouse can share in the member spouse’s retirement benefits. The amount is determined based on the benefit the member spouse would have received from their fund at the date of divorce.
2. Worries about financial survival:
It is possible to obtain an interim maintenance order. If you’re concerned about how you will survive financially in the period between separation and the finalisation of your divorce, speak to the divorce attorney handling your case about bringing an application for interim relief.
The application can be in relation to interim childcare, maintenance for the spouse or children involved, enforced payment of costs such as school fees and bond repayments, or financial assistance with legal fees.
3. Not updating your will after your divorce can have disastrous consequences:
Section 2B of the Wills Act specifically deals with circumstances where a person dies after having been divorced, providing three months’ leeway for divorcing spouses to amend their wills in line with their new circumstances. Not updating your will after your divorce can have disastrous consequences and may result in your spouse unintentionally inheriting from you.
This means that if a person dies within three months of her divorce, her estate will be distributed as if her ex-spouse had died before her. In other words, her ex-spouse will not stand to benefit from her estate. However, after the expiration of three months and in the absence of an amended will, it will be assumed that the testatrix intended for her ex-spouse to inherit in terms of her will.
4. Spousal maintenance is not a given right:
When a couple is legally married, a reciprocal duty of support is created, which means that each spouse is obliged to provide for the other to the extent that they are able to. Upon divorce, this duty of support comes to an end when a marriage is dissolved through death or divorce.
While the Divorce Act makes provision for the court to make orders relating to spousal maintenance, it is important to keep in mind that neither spouse has a statutory right to maintenance. The court has full discretion relating to such orders, including the discretion to award no maintenance to the spouse applying for spousal support.
5. You may be liable for some of your spouse’s debt:
The financial implications of a COP (community of property) marriage can be quite onerous, especially when it comes to debt. If you marry in community of property, you and your spouse have a single, joint estate, which you own together in equal, indivisible shares, including all debt that was incurred both before and after the date of marriage.
This means that on divorce, you may find yourselves responsible for having incurred 50% of all your spouse’s debt, and vice versa.
The Star