Divorce and exceptional compensation

In Monaco, the financial consequences of divorce remain bounded to his cause and the entitlement to a compensatory lump sum (a capital grants to compensate the disparity due to the marriage breakdown) depends on how fault is divided between the spouses, in case of fault-divorce. In case the divorce is granted against the economically disadvantaged party, this party will not be in position to obtain a compensatory lump sum.

However, in such case the legislator has foreseen that an exceptional compensation may be granted to the said spouse, given the duration of the common lifetime, the career choices made during this time in order to educate the children or to favor the career needs of his/her spouse to the detriment of her/his own career, when it would be manifestly contrary to fairness to refuse to this spouse any financial compensation based on the marriage breakdown.

In order to qualify for this exceptional compensation, the spouse has to ask for it as of the divorce summons. Otherwise, the judge is not able to allow this compensation on its own initiative. Thus the economically weakest party will get no financial compensation despite the obvious imbalance caused by the divorce.