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Cross-border workers: estimating your French, Belgian or German pension
Did you work in France, Belgium or Germany before or during your Luxembourg career? Each country will pay you its own share of pension. Here is how it is calculated, and how to obtain an indicative estimate of it — then the official amount.
Each country pays its share (European coordination)
Within the EU/EEA and Switzerland, Regulation (EC) No 883/2004 coordinates the schemes without merging them: you do not receive a single pension, but a pension from each country where you were insured. To establish entitlement, the periods completed in the other countries are "aggregated" (added together). For the amount, each country calculates two versions and pays the more favourable one: the "national" pension (based on your local periods only) and the "pro rata" pension (theoretical full-career amount, reduced to the local share). As a result: your Luxembourg share depends solely on your career in Luxembourg; your French, Belgian or German share depends on your career in that country.
France — basic scheme
The basic pension of the general scheme is calculated as follows: average annual salary (average of the 25 best years, each salary being capped at the Social Security ceiling — 48 060 € in 2026) × 50 % (full rate) × (insurance duration / reference duration, capped at 1). The reference duration reaches 172 quarters (43 years) for recent generations (CSS art. L351-1, R351-27; loi n°2023-270). On top of this comes the AGIRC-ARRCO supplementary pension, mandatory for private-sector employees and which often represents 30 à 40 % of the total. We do not quantify it here (its scales are not published by any official State source): use the official simulator info-retraite.fr, which includes both the basic and supplementary pensions.
Germany — statutory points-based scheme
The German statutory scheme (gesetzliche Rentenversicherung) works on a points basis (Entgeltpunkte). Each year, you earn a number of points equal to your gross salary divided by the national average salary for that year (51 944 € in 2026), up to a ceiling. At retirement, the monthly pension = total points × point value ("aktueller Rentenwert": 40,79 € since 1 July 2025). A full career at the average salary gives about 1 835 € gross/month (§ 64 SGB VI). The statutory retirement age (Regelaltersgrenze) is 67 years for people born from 1964 onwards.
Belgium — 60 % or 75 % per 45th
The Belgian employee pension accrues year by year: for each year, your gross salary (capped) is taken, divided by 45 (full career) and a rate of 60 % (single) or 75 % (household, if your spouse has no income of their own) is applied. All the years are added together (arrêté royal du 23 décembre 1996, art. 5). The salary ceiling is 82 608,94 €/year. The statutory retirement age is rising gradually to 66 years, then 67 years (the 1964 generation and after).
Estimate your foreign share on MaPension.lu
In the calculator, open the advanced "year-by-year career" mode, add a period and choose the country (France, Belgium or Germany): an "average annual salary" field appears. The tool then displays an indicative estimate of your pension in that country, based on the official formulas above. This is a simplified order of magnitude (average salary × years, in today's euros), not the official calculation: it replaces neither the 883/2004 coordination nor the calculation by the pension funds.
Obtaining the official amount
For the amount that is authoritative: France — info-retraite.fr (basic + AGIRC-ARRCO); Germany — Deutsche Rentenversicherung (deutsche-rentenversicherung.de); Belgium — mypension.be. You only have one application to submit, in your country of residence: the contact institution (in Luxembourg, the CNAP) forwards it to the other countries, which each calculate and notify their share. You receive a summary (document P1).
Official sources: France — service-public.gouv.fr (F21552), Légifrance (CSS art. L351-1/R351-27, PASS decrees), info-retraite.fr. Germany — gesetze-im-internet.de (SGB VI), Deutsche Rentenversicherung. Belgium — Service fédéral des Pensions (sfpd.fgov.be), arrêté royal du 23/12/1996 (Moniteur belge). Coordination: Regulation (EC) 883/2004; CNAP (cnap.public.lu).