I am currently receiving my state pension at a rate of £180.97 per week. After reviewing my National Insurance records, I discovered that I have 37 years of full contributions and seven years with no full contributions between 1977 and 1984. During this period, I was caring for my children, who were born in 1976 and 1979, and I returned to work in 1984 once my youngest child reached five years old. I am wondering if I should receive a higher pension considering the seven-year discrepancy period when I was caring for my children.
The Government recently acknowledged that over 200,000 people, mostly mothers, have been underpaid state pensions due to errors in recording time spent at home with children on National Insurance records. This issue primarily affects individuals who claimed child benefit before May 2000 and did not provide their NI number on the claim form, as it was not required at the time.
To determine if you are one of the individuals affected and what steps to take, please continue reading below.
It is important to note that before 1978/79, the years when someone was not working due to family responsibilities would not count towards their state pension. The introduction of the Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP) scheme in 1978/79 aimed to consider the time spent raising children when calculating state pensions.
Each year from 1978/79 onwards, when you were receiving child benefit for a child under 16, it would count as a year of HRP. However, there are three main conditions to fulfill for this to apply: the child must be under 16 for the full financial year, the child benefit must be in your name, and you should not have been paying National Insurance at the reduced ‘married woman’s rate’ during that year.
Based on the information provided, it seems likely that you are entitled to HRP for the years 1978/79 to 1983/84 inclusive. However, it’s important to note that HRP years do not count in full towards your pension but are instead deducted from the target of 39 years for a full pension.
For example, if you had 19 years of full contributions and 5 years of HRP, instead of adding them together, they would deduct the 5 HRP years from your target, resulting in 19 full years towards a reduced target of 34 years.
It’s crucial to check your National Insurance record to see if HRP is reflected as a full qualifying year. If you reached pension age prior to April 6, 2010, HRP will not show on your NI record as a full qualifying year. To confirm if HRP is present, you can contact the National Insurance helpline.
If HRP is missing from your record, you would only see an increase in your pension if your basic state pension is currently less than £156.20, the current figure. In cases where individuals already receive the maximum amount for their basic pension, any error in HRP would not affect their pension.
HMRC is planning to write to individuals who may be at risk of missing out due to errors on their NI records. However, since the records of child benefit recipients from the 1980s and 1990s have been destroyed, it is challenging for them to determine who is affected definitively.
If HRP is missing, you can claim your HRP by filling out the Home Responsibilities Protection form. It’s worth noting that HMRC may take a long time to process HRP claims, and the DWP may take even longer to update pension entitlement. Therefore, it is advisable to submit your claim as soon as possible if you are certain that you are missing out.
If you have any further pension-related questions, you can email former Pensions Minister Steve Webb at [email protected]. He will do his best to address your query in a future column. Please ensure to include a daytime contact number, which will be kept confidential and not used for marketing purposes. If Steve is unable to answer your question, you can contact MoneyHelper for free assistance on pensions.
Denial of responsibility! VigourTimes is an automatic aggregator of Global media. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, and all materials to their authors. For any complaint, please reach us at – [email protected]. We will take necessary action within 24 hours.
