Park Ridge QDRO/QILDRO Lawyers

Elmhurst Family Law Attorneys Certified to Draft Qualified Domestic Relations Orders

The attorneys at Weiss-Kunz & Oliver, LLC are certified to draft QDROs and QILDROS. Please contact us today for pricing. Our rates are competitive. You do not have to be a current or ongoing client to contact us for this service. We can contract with you individually to provide this service to you/your lawyer. Further, we can provide this service for anyone in the State of Illinois. It is not County specific!

What is a QDRO? To explain what a QDRO is, we first need to explain the history of retirement assets. When a person has saved money in a retirement account (401(k), Traditional IRA, Roth IRA, 403(b), TRS, etc.), these funds are usually only accessible to the account holder. For example, employee pension benefits will usually only be paid to the person who worked in a pension-eligible position after that person's retirement. However, there are some situations where funds in a retirement account may be transferred to someone else, or some of a person's pension benefits may be paid to another person. These situations generally occur following a couple's divorce, and decisions about how retirement savings and pensions will be allocated may be addressed during the division of marital property incident to the divorce. In many cases, these transfers or allocations will be completed using a court order known as a Qualified Domestic Relations Order (QDRO).

To ensure that retirement accounts and pensions will be divided correctly, the parties in a divorce will want to work with an attorney who has experience creating court orders and ensuring that they are executed properly. At Weiss-Kunz & Oliver, LLC, certain members of our team are certified to draft both QDROs and Qualified Illinois Domestic Relations Orders (QILDROs). We can ensure that these orders will correctly address the division of retirement accounts and pension benefits, and we can also help identify and resolve any concerns that may affect a couple's ability to divide their marital assets fairly and equitably.

Using QDROs to Divide Retirement Accounts

An employer-sponsored retirement account such as a 401(k) will be in the name of the employee, and that person will be able to begin receiving distributions from the account once they retire. When a couple decides to divorce, they may agree to divide the funds in a retirement account. However, withdrawals that occur before the account holder reaches the applicable retirement age (which is usually 59 ½) will usually result in a penalty of 10 percent of the amount that is withdrawn. The recipient may also be required to pay income taxes on the withdrawn amount.

If a QDRO is used to effectuate a transfer from a retirement account, early withdrawal penalties will not apply. If the funds are transferred into another retirement account owned by the other party, that person will not be required to pay income taxes at the time of the rollover incident to the QDRO, until they receive distributions from their account after their retirement.

Once approved, the QDRO will be sent to the administrator of the retirement plan. It will state the amount that will be withdrawn from the account, either as a specific dollar figure or as a percentage of the account's total funds. It will also specify that the funds being withdrawn will be paid to a person other than the account holder (i.e., the ex-spouse). QDROs must be drafted correctly to ensure that both the account holder and the other party will be able to avoid complications or any other issues that may affect the transfer of funds. An improperly drafted QDRO will be rejected by the plan administrator.

Using QILDROs to Divide Illinois State Pension Benefits

Employees of the State of Illinois who are eligible to receive pension benefits may be required to divide these benefits with their ex-spouse incident to their divorce. To do so, they will be required to use a Qualified Illinois Domestic Relations Order. A QILDRO will also be issued by a court, and it will specify an alternate payee (the ex-spouse) who will be paid a portion of the person's pension benefits. Like a QDRO, the amount that will be paid to the alternate payee may be a specific dollar amount or a percentage of the benefits that are paid. The alternate payee may also receive a portion of any termination refund, lump-sum retirement benefits, or death benefits.

Illinois state pension benefits can only be paid to an alternate payee if a valid QILDRO is issued by a court. In many cases, it may not be possible to process a QILDRO until the date of a person's retirement is known, since the percentage of benefits that will be paid to their ex-spouse cannot be determined until they know the total number of years that they worked in a pension-eligible position. To ensure that a QILDRO will include all required information that will allow benefits to be properly paid to an alternate payee, it is important to work with an attorney who has experience drafting and executing these orders. Weiss-Kunz & Oliver, LLC has that experience.

Contact Our Cook and DuPage County Qualified Domestic Relations Orders Attorneys

To ensure that issues related to the division of retirement accounts and pensions will be handled correctly, spouses can work with a lawyer from Weiss-Kunz & Oliver, LLC who understands the legal issues that affect QDROs and QILDROs. Our firm has the knowledge and experience needed to create and execute these orders, and we will work to protect the rights and interests of the parties involved. Our rates are competitive, and you do not have to be a current or former client to contact us for this service. We can contract with you individually for the sole purpose of drafting your QDRO or QILDRO. Further, we can provide this drafting service for anyone in the State of Illinois, and it is not County specific! To learn more about how we can help you with your QDRO or QILDRO needs, contact our office by calling 312-605-4041.