Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP)

mary

Qualifying years should be years that you have worked. Do not assume anything. Charming as the people who work there, your records are really not always accurate. So I suggest you write down a track record of the places you have worked and the dates, as precisely as you can. Then armed with that information, ring them, giving your NI number, and get them to check your record through with you while you are on the phone. Do not accept what they tell you first time round as being gospel. I had to persevere for a long time before my record was corrected. I happen, sadly, to be a very meticulous person, but sometimes it has it's benefits. You can buy back some years, I think you can go back for about the last five or six, not certain. Last year, I paid 3 x annual voluntary contributions, which amounted to around 3 x £350 ish.

Just got to make it until 60 now, to get the money back!!!!

tanith

I have been working continuously for the last 19yrs and the years I didn't work are before 1989 so does that mean I cannot buy back years from that long ago?

The sensible thing is to do what u say and ring them I just have to work out the years and where I did work..... considering I am accused of having Alzheimers by my grandkids all the time it should prove interesting...

mary

I don't think you will be able to pay for those earlier years, it's too far back, but nothing venture, nothing gain. Ask and they will tell you. Look at the inland revenue website, pension section in the meantime, to learn as much as you can.

Good luck

Cook_County

As this is a money-saving site it is worth saying that you may have credited contributions for years you did not work. These would have occured if you claimed HRP, other benefits (such as the dole - currently known as jobseekers allowance but in those days as unemployment benefit) or if you worked outside of the UK in a country with a social security agreement covering benefits.

Almost everyone in your situation should request state pension forecasts every 2 or 3 years to make certain they have it right (my forecast had me down as paying contracted out contributions when I was not contracted out) so these things should be checked.

Incidentally, it is not surprising to see that the IFAs who happily chat here on pensions have remained silent in this debate, given that they can't earn commission from recommending claiming State benefits!

mummytofour

Gee Im starting to worry now, I have 4 and a bump plus more are planned I didnt know that you only get 21 yrs of hrp thank you for letting me know.

Vxx

CIS

For reference HRP does not credit contributions, it works on a different basis.

from my earlier post

eg.

You need 39 years and have 25 qualifying years and 5 years HRP = 100/34 * 25 = 74% pension

You need 39 years and have 30 qualifying years of credits and 0 years HRP = 100/39 * 30 = 77% pension

If you had only 15 HRP on record you would not receive any state pension, whereas if you had 15 qualifying yrs,you would get minimum of (100/44)*15 =35%.

The idea of HRP is not that it contributes towards the State Pension that you will get, but it acts as a leveller to help protect the ability to achieve a State Pension for those who have missed work to care for someone or bring up children


tanith;

You will receive a minimum of (100/ (44 - 11))* 23 = 70% if you retire at 65 or (100/ (39-11))*23 = 83% if you retire at 60, based on your current estimate. If you retire between 60 and 65, the amount will be somewhere between the two figures.

Generally speaking you can pay back only up to 6 tax years, even under the extended payment period that the revenue introduced only went back as far as 1996. Unfortunately 19 years is too far.

mummytofour;

You can actually get up to 22 years of HRP based on your D.O.B, if you where born after 1955.
But even if you get the maximum HRP, remember that entitlement to a state pension still requires that

1)you have at least 1 qualifying year in which you have paid class 1/2 or 3 conts (you cant rely solely on NI credits)

2) You must have qualifying years (class 1/2/3 or credits) for at least 25% of the requisite years you need for a full pension.

ie. if you need 22 years, reduced from 44 years by having 22yrs of HRP. Then you must have a minimum of 6 qualifying yrs to get any state pension.

EdInvestor

Cook_County wrote:

Almost everyone in your situation should request state pension forecasts every 2 or 3 years to make certain they have it right (my forecast had me down as paying contracted out contributions when I was not contracted out) so these things should be checked.

Agreed, there was a period of several years when the computer was down and no contributions got processed.I know of someone who eventually discovered this ( people didn't get told), paid the missing contributions in a lump sum, and then several years later when updating the pension forecast, discovered the lump sum had not been credited and the years were still "missing."

So make sure you keep bank records of any payments as well.

CIS

The year with the NI problems was 1996/97. It wasn't so much that they didn't get processed, there was an error with the NIRS 2 computer system that decided not to pull over all of the previous computer systems records in the way that it should have done meaning that records where incomplete.

The case above sounds like the 'deficency notice' problem where IR stopped sending out reminders that people could pay NI to secure a qualifying year. This wasn't actually an error, it was a conscious but misguided decision by someone in IR to save on the cost of notifying people when IR dont have any legal compulsion to.

I agree that its worth checking but cases with missing records are luckily in the minority, but in my experience its actually a lot less common then people think.