7.  The applicant was born in 1935 and lives in the Orenburg Region. 8.  As of 25 August 1995 the applicant has been in receipt of his old-age pension from the social security authorities. 9.  On 23 June 1997 the Federal Law on Calculating and Upgrading State Pensions («О порядке исчисления и увеличения государственных пенсий», “the Pensions Law”) was adopted. It introduced a new scheme of calculating retirement benefits – “Individual Pensioner Coefficient” (“IPC”). 10.  On 1 February 1998 the amount of the applicant’s pension was re-assessed according to the Pensions Law. The Sakmarsky District Welfare Office of the Orenburg Region (Управление социальной защиты населения Сакмарского района Оренбургской области) decided that the IPC to be applied in the applicant’s case should be 0.420. 11.  The applicant, who believed that he was eligible to an IPC of 0.641, sued the Sakmarsky District Welfare Office for insufficient increase of his pension. 12.  On 11 October 1999 the Sakmarskiy District Court of the Orenburg Region found that the defendant had misinterpreted the Pensions Law. It granted the applicant’s claim to apply the IPC at 0.641 for calculating his pension, increasing it by RUR 400, and awarded him arrears of RUR 3,647.82. 13.  On 16 December 1999 the Orenburg Regional Court dismissed the defendant’s appeal, and the judgment of 11 October 1999 became final. 14.  On 10 July 2000 the President of the Orenburg Regional Court lodged an extraordinary appeal (протест в порядке надзора) against the judgment of 11 October 1999. 15.  On 17 July 2000 the Presidium of the Orenburg Regional Court examined the extraordinary appeal in the supervisory review procedure. 16.  The Presidium found that the lower courts misinterpreted the Pensions Law. It varied the judgment of 11 October 1999 and the decision of 16 December 1999 by reinstating the applicant’s IPC at 0.420 and annulling the previously awarded increase as well as the arrears.