Compensatory Pension. Extinction of the pension as a result of the pension received by the wife from her mother.

The aforementioned judgment expressly states:

"This Chamber has had occasion to rule in the judgment of 3 October 2011 on the possible impact of the inheritance received by the spouse receiving the pension, in order to appreciate the concurrence of the substantial alteration referred to in Article 100 CC  or, the disappearance of the imbalance determining the recognition of the right to pension, referred to as a cause of extinction of the same Article 101 CC. It was said that "In theory, it is reasonable to assess the fact of receiving an inheritance as a circumstance not foreseeable and, therefore, that should not be taken into account when setting the compensatory pension. Understood as a supervening circumstance, impossible or difficult to assess a priori, likely to have a favourable impact on the economic situation of the beneficiary or creditor of the pension, the receipt of the inheritance would fall within the concept of substantial alteration of those initial circumstances, which is the prerequisite set out in Article 100 CC  for the claim to modify the amount of the pension awarded to be upheld. However, whether in practice such an alteration actually takes place with this substantial or essential character as a consequence of the accepted inheritance is something that cannot be affirmed until after examining the circumstances of the specific case, and in particular, after assessing its economic importance, the creditor's availability of the assets that comprise it, and, in short, the effective possibility of making them economically profitable (because without this profitability, the mere acceptance of the inheritance will not result in an improvement of the economic situation)".

Well, taking into account the facts that have been established regarding what is known about the inheritance and the unforeseeable nature of this as a determining factor for the pension, given that it was not possible to know when it could happen nor could it be taken into account as a determining factor in the calculation of the pension, the judgment under appeal may not only be reviewable in cassation, but is useful for the purpose of establishing case law based on the interest of the appeal. Inheritance can be taken into account in this case when judging the existence or non-existence of the current imbalance, given that, according to the proven facts, it is evident that the imbalance has been overcome. This Chamber has repeatedly said that the compensatory pension is conceived in the law as a means to avoid the imbalance produced in one of the spouses by the separation or divorce, but this does not imply that it is a means to achieve equality between the spouses (SSTS 864/2010, 19 January 2010, 25 November 2011, 20 June 2013, among others). This imbalance has disappeared according to the evidence and therefore, the raison d'être of the pension also disappears".