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Other Benefits: Survivor Benefits

There is an active-duty variant of the military retiree Survivor Benefit Plan.

Spouse and/or child SBP coverage is automatic and free for all active-duty members who are eligible for retirement (at least 20 years of service) and die while still serving on active duty.

For a member who is not yet retirement-eligible, the death must be classified as in the line of duty in order for an annuity to be paid to the member’s survivors.

The immediately payable SBP annuity is 55 percent of the retired pay that the member would have received if he or she had been medically retired with a 100-percent disability rating on the date of death.

The active-duty SBP annuity is reduced dollar for dollar by any amount of dependency and indemnity compensation (DIC) paid to the spouse of a deceased member by the Department of Veterans Affairs, although this offset is being partially reduced under a provision of the 2008 Defense Authorization Act.

SBP payments are not offset by any DIC payments to a deceased member’s children.