Eligibility

You will be eligible for a service retirement benefit when you reach age 55 and have five or more years of credited service after July 1, 1973. If you recently changed employers, you may have to complete five additional years of service with your new employer before you can retire with the benefits provided by this plan.

To receive the full retirement benefit, you must be 62 years old at retirement or, if you have 30 years of credited service, you may retire as early as age 55. With less than 30 years, you may retire as early as age 55, but you will receive a reduced benefit.

The Benefit

With 20 or more years of service credit, your service retirement benefit will be 2 percent of your Final Average Salary (FAS) for each year of service credit. If you retire with less than 20 years of service credit, your benefit will be 1.66 percent of your FAS for each year of service credit.

If you made annuity savings contributions, your benefit will also include an annuity purchased by the contributions and the interest they earned.

Under this plan, the pension portion of your retirement benefit cannot exceed 75 percent of your FAS. This limit is raised to 79 percent of your FAS if you are eligible to receive the additional service credit provided by Article 19 of the RSSL.

Other Retirement Benefits

If the pension portion of your retirement benefit exceeds 75 percent of your FAS, you may qualify for a higher retirement benefit under certain circumstances:

• For New York State employees employed by the State on March 31, 1970, the benefit provided by Section 75-h will be compared to the benefit provided by Section 75-f.
• For employees of local government employers, the benefit provided by Section 75-i will be compared to the benefit provided by Section 75-g.

Sections 75-f and 75-g provide an annual benefit equal to 50 percent of your FAS for 25 years of service credit plus 1.66 percent of your FAS for each year of service credit over 25 years, with no cap. You will receive the greater benefit if you meet one of the above requirements.

Filing

Your service retirement application must be on file with the Office of the State Comptroller at least 15 days, but not more than 90 days, before the date on which your retirement will occur. The 15-day filing requirement is waived if you are over age 70 at retirement.

To apply for retirement, sign in to your Retirement Online account, go to the ‘My Account Summary’ area of your Account Homepage and click “Apply for Retirement.” You can also apply by mail by submitting the Application for Service Retirement (RS6037).

Read the Receiving Your Benefits section for more information about filing.