ADF Cover—when you’re serving

If you die while you’re serving and you have ADF Cover, a Death benefit is payable to your beneficiaries.

We cover you while you’re on the job, and if you die from natural causes or from injuries or events that are not service related.

How much is payable?

Generally, the benefit amount we pay is 25% of the amount a member would have earned if they had continued to serve in the ADF until they turned 60.

We calculate this using the salary reported for ADF Cover purposes that applied at the time of death.

To find out how much you’re covered for, use our Death in service calculator.

Who receives the Death benefit?

In the first instance, the Death benefit is payable to a surviving spouse and/or eligible children. Strict eligibility rules need to be satisfied before a person is deemed a surviving spouse or eligible child. You’ll find the insurance definitions for these terms under Important Death benefit definitions on this page.

We pay Death benefits in the following order:

1. to the surviving spouse and eligible children; or
2. to eligible children if there is no surviving spouse; or
3. to nominated beneficiaries who are listed in the member’s will and who were dependent on the member just before the member’s death (but only if there is no surviving spouse or eligible children); or
4. to the member’s estate if the benefit is not payable to anyone else.

Is your non-binding beneficiary nomination up to date?

Though legislation governs who gets your Death benefit if you die, you may want to nominate who you’d prefer it to go to if you don’t have a surviving spouse or eligible children.

Nominate a beneficiary

This type of nomination is non-binding, which means if we determine that you are survived by a spouse or eligible children, CSC must pay your Death benefit in line with legislative requirements and not according to your non-binding nomination.

Death benefit calculations and payment types

• A surviving spouse may receive a lump sum or pension

  If your Death benefit is payable to your surviving spouse, they can receive it as lump sum or an annual pension.

  Lump sum calculation

  We calculate the lump sum for spouse by multiplying:

  The customer’s number of prospective years of service to age 60

  x

  Their reported salary for ADF Cover purposes at time of death

  x

  25%

   

  Pension calculation

  We calculate the base annual pension for a spouse by multiplying:

  The customer’s number of prospective years of service to age 60

  x

  Their reported salary for ADF Cover purposes at time of death

  x

  1.5%

  If the total pension calculation works out to be less than $5,000 per year, we must convert it to a lump sum. The value of the small pension lump sum is 16.5 times the annual rate of the pension.

   

• Eligible children may receive a supplementary pension

  If you die and you have a surviving spouse and eligible children, on top of the lump sum or pension payable to your spouse, an annual supplementary pension is payable to each eligible child.

  We calculate the child’s supplementary pension by multiplying:

  The basic rate of the spouse’s pension to age 60

  x

  The child supplement per cent that applies based on the number of children (x 17% if 1 child) (x 33% if 2 children) (x 50% if 3+ children)

   

• Or eligible children may receive a lump sum

  If you die and you don’t have a surviving spouse, we pay the Death benefit lump sum to eligible children. This amount cannot be paid as a pension, and it will be divided among eligible children.

  We calculate the lump sum by multiplying:

  The customer’s number of prospective years of service to age 60

  x

  Their reported salary for ADF Cover purposes at time of death

  x

  25%

   

If there are no eligible beneficiaries

If you are not survived by an eligible spouse or eligible children, your lump sum Death benefit is payable to the executor of your will or the administrator of your estate.

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