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What a Creditor Cannot Take — VA Compensation, Military Retired Pay and Survivor Annuities

The Attorney General publishes the list of funds exempt from garnishment in Georgia, and gives military money a section of its own: veterans benefits including military pensions, retirement pay and disability payments; veterans survivor annuities; and — a Georgia provision with no federal twin — the wages of a service member or their spouse where the creditor is a payday lender.

Verified August 23, 2026

What this benefit is

The Attorney General publishes the list of funds exempt from garnishment in Georgia, and gives military money a section of its own: veterans benefits including military pensions, retirement pay and disability payments; veterans survivor annuities; and — a Georgia provision with no federal twin — the wages of a service member or their spouse where the creditor is a payday lender.

What it's worth: Veterans benefits, military retired pay, disability payments and survivor annuities are on the exempt list

  • The Attorney General’s own publication groups the exemptions by type and lists, under MILITARY: "38 U.S.C. § 5301: Veterans benefits, including military pensions, retirement pay, and disability payments"; "10 U.S.C. § 1450: Veterans survivor annuities"; "38 U.S.C. § 7297: Veterans Appeals Court Survivor Annuities"; and "O.C.G.A. § 16-17-9: Wages earned by members of the United States military or their spouses in connection with payday lenders."
  • No dollar figure applies. The value is that the money is not reachable at all, rather than reachable up to a limit.
  • Other entries on the same list will often matter alongside these — Social Security retirement, disability and survivor benefits under 42 U.S.C. §407, workers’ compensation under O.C.G.A. §§34-9-84 and 34-9-382, and unemployment benefits under O.C.G.A. §34-8-252 are all on it.
  • An exemption is not self-executing. It has to be claimed in the garnishment proceeding, with proof that the money in the account is the exempt money.

Who is entitled to it

  • The military section of the exemption list reaches the service member or veteran, a surviving annuitant, and a spouse where the creditor is a payday lender.
  • Your home is in Georgia.

Not sure whether that describes you?

Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.

How to claim it

Deadline: Set by the court — act the day the garnishment papers arrive
  1. 1Read the garnishment papers the day they arrive and find the notice telling you how to claim an exemption. This is time-limited in a way that does not forgive delay.
  2. 2Identify the money by name and by its citation. "Veterans benefits, including military pensions, retirement pay, and disability payments" is exempt under 38 U.S.C. §5301 on the Attorney General’s own list.
  3. 3If you draw a survivor annuity, that is a separate entry — 10 U.S.C. §1450 for a veterans survivor annuity, and 38 U.S.C. §7297 for a Veterans Appeals Court survivor annuity.
  4. 4If the creditor is a payday lender, raise O.C.G.A. §16-17-9 as well. It exempts wages earned by a member of the United States military or their spouse in connection with payday lenders, and it is a Georgia rule rather than a federal one.
  5. 5Be ready to prove the money is what you say it is. A court will want to see that the funds in the account are the exempt funds, which is far easier where the benefit is direct-deposited into an account that holds nothing else.
  6. 6Think about account hygiene before there is ever a garnishment. Mixing exempt compensation with wages in one account is what turns a clear exemption into an argument.
  7. 7Check the rest of the list while you are there. Social Security, workers’ compensation, unemployment, Medicaid payments and crime victim compensation each have their own entry, and a household often has more than one exempt stream.
  8. 8Ask the clerk of the court that issued the garnishment what the filing deadline for a claim of exemption is in that court, and get the answer before you draft anything.
Form
A claim of exemption in the garnishment proceeding
File with
The court in which the garnishment was filed
No renewal
Once granted it does not need renewing.
CorrectionExempt does not mean untouchable in practice. A bank served with a garnishment will commonly freeze the account first and sort out the exemption afterwards, so the protection is only as good as the claim you file — and the proof that the frozen money is the exempt money.
CorrectionThe payday lender entry is a Georgia rule and it reaches the spouse. O.C.G.A. §16-17-9 exempts wages earned by members of the United States military or their spouses in connection with payday lenders — ordinary earned wages, not benefits, and only against that class of creditor.
Worth knowingKeeping VA compensation in an account of its own is the single most useful thing a veteran can do about this in advance. Commingling exempt compensation with wages is what forces a tracing argument in front of a judge.
Known gapThe Attorney General’s publication lists what is exempt but not how or when to claim it, and the statutory text of O.C.G.A. §§18-4-15 and 18-4-82 was not served to us by an official Georgia host this session. The filing deadline for a claim of exemption is therefore not published here — ask the court.

Sources

This finder provides an informational match, not a government eligibility determination. The responsible agency decides your application.