This is how unemployment (or a part) can be seized if you have debts

Unemployment is a contributory benefit that is intended to cover unemployed people. However, it is not an amount that comes without conditions: you have to meet certain conditions and not break other commandments to continue receiving it. And yet, if we have debts, our unemployment may still be in danger.

The State Public Employment Service (SEPE) that their benefits, including unemployment, can be seized “in application of a court order or administrative resolution and in the amount that the executive title provides.”

The same body explains that there is a limit for the unemployment embargo, that of the Minimum Interprofessional Wage (SMI), currently 950 euros in 14 payments and 1,108.33 in 14 payments.

However, there may be exceptions. They are collected by the , which opens the door for benefits and pensions below the SMI to be seized whenever they are amounts owed as alimony to sons or daughters and compensatory pension to the ex-spouse.

Of course, the decision of what amount to seize would always remain in the hands of the judges. A group that, on the other hand, has starred in judgments that, at least, leave a part of the pension protected from creditors. This is determined, for example, by one leaving the amount equivalent to the non-contributory retirement pension untouchable.

At that time, the court decided to cover a part of the benefit to guarantee the economic survival of the debtor, preventing him from being deprived “of the essential means to carry out his personal purposes as well as in the protection of the family, the maintenance of health and the use of dignified and adequate housing”.

This is what they seize you from unemployment

For the rest of the benefits that are above the SMI, including the unemployment of certain people, the reductions contemplated in the Civil Procedure Law can be applied. It is a table that divides according to the debtor’s income, but for the amount of SEPE benefits, a discount of 30% applies, which corresponds to cases between the SMI and double the SMI.

Thus, if he receives an unemployment benefit of 1,200 euros (at least in the first six months), the citizen will see how 360 euros, 30%, are deducted from his unemployment, and he will only collect 840 euros those months until he pays off the debt.