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For HR teams and employer of record firms to hand to leaving staff

Leaving Spain? Your pension in three steps

Tu Seguridad Social: Personal Seguridad Social account with the informe de vida laboral contribution record and pension calculator; access by Cl@ve, an electronic certificate or SMS. To sign up to the ordinary convenio especial (voluntary continued contributions to Spanish Social Security), the application must be submitted within 1 year, counted for most people from the day after the effective date of deregistration from the Social Security scheme.

PensionHunter is independent and not affiliated with the institutions named here.

The official routes come first here. Each line below names its official source and the date we read it. We identify; we do not advise.

1. What to keep before you leave

  • The dates of every Spanish job.Spain pays a contributory retirement pension once you have 15 years of contributions, which the Seguridad Social states as 5,475 days, with at least 2 of those years falling inside the 15 years immediately before entitlement arises.Source: seg-social.es and BOE Real Decreto 241/2026, read 3 October 2026
  • The countries and years you were insured outside Spain.Under European coordination Spain must add the insurance periods you completed in other member states to your Spanish ones, provided they do not overlap, and test the 15 year condition against the combined total.Source: seg-social.es and BOE Real Decreto 241/2026, read 3 October 2026
  • Any mobile number you gave the Spanish Social Security.The SMS option works only if your mobile number was previously registered with the Tesoreria, which a foreign number never is, and registering one means filing a form with your DNI or NIE plus documentation proving the phone is yours.Source: seg-social.es and revista.seg-social.es, read 3 October 2026
  • The Spanish address the Spanish Social Security holds for you.The postal option works only if the address the Tesoreria holds for you still matches where you live, and correcting it calls for Spanish municipal register evidence a non-resident does not have.Source: seg-social.es and revista.seg-social.es, read 3 October 2026

2. The official route from abroad

  • The Seguridad Social's personal area accepts Cl@ve Permanente, Cl@ve Movil, DNIe, an electronic certificate or an SMS code.Source: seg-social.es and revista.seg-social.es, read 3 October 2026
  • Former workers resident in another EU country file the Spanish pension application with the institution of their country of residence, which forwards it to the INSS.Source: seg-social.es, read 21 August 2026

Official contacts

3. Clocks that start on leaving

From our deadline register and the official sources it cites.

  • You nominate the date your pension starts, that date must fall within three months either side of the day you apply, and payable retroactivity is capped at three months from the application, so the date you apply is worth money.Source: seg-social.es and mjusticia.gob.es, read 3 October 2026
  • Getting Cl@ve itself carries its own clock: the invitation letter route posts a 16 character code to the tax address held on file, and you have 60 days to use it before it expires.Source: seg-social.es and mjusticia.gob.es, read 3 October 2026

We write to most pension authorities in the countries we cover, stay in contact with them and update our facts as they answer. Read their written answers.

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Free to print and hand out. Printed from pensionhunter.ai/leaving/spain. Facts read up to 3 October 2026; each line carries its own read date.

More on this country: your pension after leaving Spain.