Oh the timing ... I did not receive my Swiss pension this month - normally it's like clockwork (ha ha) - so I 'phoned to ask why not, was told that my pension had been suspended as I hadn't provided Proof of Life as they had requested several months ago. I said that I had not received such a request, so they emailed me a duplicate request.

I printed that and took it to the town hall, all was verified, stamped as usual but this time I forwarded the scanned document back to Swiss SCO saying that the original (which they continue to insist on) will be forwarded by postal services.

There was a failure somewhere that meant that I didn't receive the original request - the subsequent postal confirmation will be mailed from within Switzerland thanks this time to a visiting family member.

Surely there has to be a better way ...

DNA? A finger? If you include thumbs that should be good for 10 POLs.

But first they still have to verify that the DNA or fingerprint is yours and that's several orders of magnitude beyond having someone sign a form for you, to post!

I rather like the idea of a proof of not dead yet certificate.
Or proof of not dun roamin

Why, we immigrants here in Spain should by now all have a TIE which has fingerprint ID.
The Uk could if it wanted too (and other countries) ask for their nationals to attend the foreigners office nearest to them and simply confirm ID. Spain etc could levy a small charge for this or it would be a reciprocated thing.

Or in the case of the Uk why not have all those with an S1 which would be all pensionable age people just go to their doctor and do the same???? Simple just like me.

But Im expecting a joined up world, which is never going to happen is it???????

Even in the remote chance that the Spanish police did want to do this, it couldn't be reciprocated, the EU citizens in the UK had to do everything remotely via a flaky app...

All passports have an NFC now, it could be done with another flaky app which reads the chip, makes you take a photo of the passport, and starts a video call where you have to hold the passport up, it's just a case of wanting to spend the cash.

This discussion simply shows how antiquated the UK system is , as a Spanish pensioner living at the moment outside of Spain I do my annual proof of life on their Vivess App on my phone. Along with 36,392 others according to last month's mailed update from the Social Security. Once the registration process is complete it is primarily based on facial recognition and only takes a couple of minutes.
The App has recently been updated to enable the user to include document on fiscal residency etc.
Easy to do and out of the way in early January.

We just have to realise that centralised IT systems in the UK are of a third-world standard. For example, there is no overall ID system, digital or otherwise.The Spanish systems are light years ahead.

Could not agree more - coming late to the party is sometimes a good thing.

On the other hand does the Spanish system of benefits compare favourably to the UKs? With rent assistance, benefit related medical treatment matters and so on?

Hang on, not even you can compare benefits with the associated admin!

Not sure what that means.

The UK pays a rage of benefits that are not contribution based - rent, free dental treatment, free eye tests, free prescriptions, disability allowances for care and mobility (including an adapted car in some situations), free wigs, free fabric supports, free hospital bed at home, free wheelchair, other grants to help stay at home....

If the governments of other countries do not provide this assistance then perhaps they are more able to provide alternative methods for people to confirm they're not dead yet.

Can I register that? A "rage of benefits"
A range, of course.

Generally I would say the Spanish State pension is more generous than the UK one but then company / employee contributions are higher .As a rough guide I estimate half the number of years worked in Spain gives double the old UK pension after 35 years.

I think this is generally true of many European countries and, of course, funded by contributions (NI and so on)
However, I referenced non-contributory benefits like "rent allowances, free dental treatment, free eye tests, free prescriptions, disability allowances for care and mobility (including an adapted car in some situations), free wigs, free fabric supports, free hospital bed at home, free wheelchair, other grants to help stay at home...."
That doesn't come free and if other countries are not spending money on that lot then they have money to spend on something else that looks nice but doesn't do a great deal for quality of life for its citizens.