Florida Retirement System Reemployment: Six-Month Rule and Exceptions

Under the Florida Retirement System reemployment rules, you can return to work for an FRS-participating employer once you have completed a six-calendar-month separation from all FRS employment following your effective retirement date. As of July 1, 2024, that is the only waiting period. The old restrictions that used to apply during months seven through twelve are gone, so once you clear the six months, you can collect your full retirement benefit and a paycheck from an FRS employer at the same time.

The Six-Month Separation Rule

Florida Statute 121.091(9) requires every FRS retiree to make a clean break from all FRS-participating employers for six full calendar months after the effective retirement date. During that window you cannot perform any work for an FRS employer in any capacity. The statute does not distinguish between full-time, part-time, temporary, OPS, adjunct, contractual, or even unpaid arrangements. If services or money flow between you and an FRS employer inside those six months, you have a violation.¹

The prohibition reaches indirect arrangements. Working through a staffing agency, consulting firm, or other third party that provides services to an FRS employer during the separation period still counts as an employment relationship. Election poll work for a covered county falls inside the definition too.²

Non-FRS Employers Are Unrestricted

Employment with an employer that does not participate in a state-administered retirement system carries no waiting period at all. You can start a new job the day after your retirement effective date and it will not affect your benefits.¹

Volunteering Inside the First Twelve Months

You can volunteer for an FRS employer during the first 12 calendar months after retirement, but Section 121.091(15) sets tight conditions. Every one of these must be met:

No agreement or understanding existed before your retirement date that you would provide any service to the employer.
Neither the employer nor any third party pays you anything, cash or cash equivalent, for the volunteer work.
Your weekly volunteer hours, training included, do not exceed 20 percent of the hours you worked per week before retiring.
Your volunteer duties are distinct from the duties of paid employees.
You control the number of hours, the timing, and the types of assignments.
You and the employer both keep records showing compliance, available to the Division of Retirement on request.

Miss any one of these and the Division may treat the arrangement as employment, with the same consequences as paid work during the separation period.¹

What the 2024 Law Change Did

Before July 2024, retirees who returned to an FRS employer during months seven through twelve had to give up something. Pension Plan members had their monthly benefit suspended for every month they worked, and Investment Plan participants could not take distributions until the full twelve months had elapsed. Those restrictions were repealed effective July 1, 2024.³

Once you complete the six-month separation, there is no further limit on working for an FRS employer. You can draw both your salary and your full retirement benefit starting in the seventh calendar month after your retirement date. Retirees who were already in months seven through twelve on July 1, 2024, saw those restrictions drop away as of that date.³

What Happens If You Come Back Too Soon

Penalties for returning inside the six-month window fall on both the retiree and the hiring employer. If you are reemployed within the first calendar month after retirement, your retirement application is voided outright.¹

For any violation during the six-month period, you and the hiring employer are jointly and severally liable to repay every dollar of retirement benefits paid from the trust fund. The Division of Retirement can collect the full amount from either side. Your benefits stay suspended until repayment is complete, and any benefits withheld beyond the end of the six-month period are credited against the repayment balance.¹

The employer is required to obtain a written statement from you confirming that you are not retired from a state-administered retirement system. Employers who skip that step share the financial exposure, and neither party can rely on ignorance as a defense once the Division audits payroll records.

DROP Participants Have More at Risk

The six-month separation applies to DROP retirees starting from the DROP termination date, and the consequences of a violation are steeper. A DROP participant who fails to fully terminate has both the retirement and the DROP election voided. FRS membership is reinstated retroactive to the date DROP began, and the employer must pay the difference between the DROP contributions that were made and the full FRS contributions that would have been required during the entire DROP period, plus 6.5 percent interest compounded annually. Federal tax penalties and surrender charges may follow if you already rolled over your DROP accumulation. You would then have to file a new retirement application with a later effective date, and reapply for DROP if you were still eligible.³

The Narrow Exceptions to the Six-Month Wait

A short list of situations lets a retiree return sooner. Eligibility usually turns on when you first retired.

Elected Office

A person holding elective office who also has a nonelected FRS position can retire from the nonelected job and continue in the elected role with no waiting period for the elected position. That retiree receives retirement benefits alongside the elected officer salary.⁴

Section 121.053 previously let a retiree who took elected office between July 1, 1990, and June 30, 2010, collect retirement benefits while enrolled in the Elected Officers’ Class. For retirees first entering or returning to elected office on or after July 1, 2010, that dual-benefit enrollment is no longer available. Those retirees can still serve in elected office, but only after the standard six-month separation.⁵

Pre-July 2010 Educational Retirees

Retirees whose effective retirement date was before July 1, 2010, can return after just one calendar month to certain positions with district school boards, Florida College System institutions, State University System institutions, charter schools, and developmental research schools. Qualifying roles include substitute or hourly teachers, adjunct instructors, phased retirement participants, paraprofessionals, transportation assistants, bus drivers, and food service workers on a noncontractual basis, or instructional personnel on an annual contract. If your retirement date was on or after July 1, 2010, the standard six-month rule applies regardless of the educational job.¹

Section 238.184 provides a parallel one-month pathway specifically for charter school principals or directors to reemploy a retired FRS member as a substitute or hourly teacher on a noncontractual basis, or as instructional personnel on an annual contract.⁶

Will You Build a Second Retirement Benefit?

Coming back to FRS-covered work does not automatically mean you accrue new benefits. The answer depends on your original plan and the date you were first reemployed.

Pension Plan retirees first reemployed on or after July 1, 2010, are not eligible for renewed membership. You earn no creditable service toward a second benefit. Your existing pension continues on whatever service credit you accumulated before retirement.⁷

Retirees of the FRS Investment Plan, the State University System Optional Retirement Program, the Senior Management Service Optional Annuity Program, or the State Community College System Optional Retirement Program who return to FRS-covered employment on or after July 1, 2017, do qualify for renewed membership. Renewed members must participate in the Investment Plan. They cannot choose the Pension Plan, cannot participate in DROP, are not eligible for disability benefits, and cannot use the Second Election.⁸

The rule is not retroactive. Anyone reemployed between July 1, 2010, and June 30, 2017, did not earn renewed membership for that stretch and cannot claim it later.⁹

A renewed member already collecting a Health Insurance Subsidy below the statutory maximum can increase that benefit through additional service, though total HIS from all periods cannot exceed $225 per month. A renewed member who did not qualify for HIS at original retirement may earn enough additional credit to qualify.³

Paperwork Your Employer Has to File

When you return to an FRS employer, the reporting form is Form FR-23, Notification of Reemployment for Suspension of Retirement Benefits. Do not confuse it with Form FR-28, which covers purchasing credit for a leave of absence.¹⁰

The employer must collect your written statement about your retirement status and report your start date and position through the FRS payroll reporting system.¹¹

Your employer pays retirement contributions on your behalf while you are reemployed, equal to the unfunded actuarial liability portion of the employer contribution that would be required for active FRS members, plus additional contributions required by Section 121.76. That cost is not deducted from your pay.¹

Once the paperwork is processed, the Division of Retirement typically sends a letter confirming whether your benefits will continue without adjustment. Keep that letter with your tax records.

Tax and Social Security Points Worth Knowing

If you retire from a public safety role and take distributions from the Investment Plan or your DROP accumulation before age 59½, the usual 10 percent federal early withdrawal penalty does not apply if you separated from service in or after the year you reached age 50, or after 25 years of service under the plan, whichever comes first. Qualifying roles include law enforcement, firefighting, emergency medical services, corrections, and forensic security positions providing care or custody of forensic patients for a state or municipality.¹²

Required Minimum Distributions from Investment Plan balances and DROP accounts begin at age 73. Some plan documents allow a delay of the first RMD until April 1 of the year after you actually retire if you are still working. Returning to work after RMDs have already started does not pause the requirement. Confirm the details with your plan administrator.¹³

Many FRS positions are not covered by Social Security. The Windfall Elimination Provision used to reduce a retiree’s Social Security retirement benefit, and the Government Pension Offset reduced spousal or survivor benefits, based on the FRS pension. The Social Security Fairness Act, signed January 5, 2025, eliminated both provisions for benefits payable for January 2024 and later. If you skipped applying for Social Security because of those reductions, you may now be eligible for higher benefits, but you have to submit an application; the repeal does not automatically trigger new payments.¹⁴

1
The Florida Legislature. Florida Code 121.091 – Benefits Payable Under the System
2
MyFRS. When Your Florida Retirement System Employment Ends
3
Florida Retirement System. FRS Employer Handbook – Chapter 13 Reemployment After Retirement
4
The Florida Legislature. Florida Code 121.053 – Participation in the Elected Officers Class for Retired Members
5
The Florida Legislature. Florida Code 121.053 – Participation in the Elected Officers Class for Retired Members
6
The Florida Legislature. Florida Code 238.184 – Charter School Instructional Personnel Reemployment After Retirement
7
Florida Retirement System. Ready, Set, Retire
8
MyFRS. Working After Retirement – Investment Plan
9
MyFRS. FRS Programs Comparing the Plans Reemployment After Retirement
10
MyFRS. FRS Resources Forms
11
Florida Retirement System. FRS Employer Handbook – Introduction and Table of Contents
12
Internal Revenue Service. Publication 575 – Pension and Annuity Income
13
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs)
14
Social Security Administration. Social Security Fairness Act