Letter from Pensions service re HRP

sylviesinc

I have been receiving my state pension since September 2007. Last week I received a letter from the Pensions service telling me that I may have been underpaid because the new NI computer that was installed failed to take into account home responsibilities protection for the years when I received child benefit for my two children. I have filled in a form and returned it to them. Has anyone else had one of these letters? I haven't read anything in the newspapers about it. Any idea how much it's likely to be?

patanne

How much it will be will depend on how many years the HRP adds to your contributions (there is a maximum). At the time you retired 39 years conts were needed for a woman to get a full state pension. If you add how many years you were not earning & getting child benefit to the no of years conts they told you you had originally and that comes to 39 (or more) then you will get a full state pension. I know this isn't perhaps as full an answer as you would like but at least it will bump it up & hopefully you'll get a more complete answer from someone.

sylviesinc

Thanks for the reply patanne. I have 21 years contributions but I had child benefit from 1978 when HRP started to 1990 when I started full time work again so I wouldn't qualify for a full pension but maybe I will get a little bit extra.

margaretclare

sylviesinc wrote: »

Thanks for the reply patanne. I have 21 years contributions but I had child benefit from 1978 when HRP started to 1990 when I started full time work again so I wouldn't qualify for a full pension but maybe I will get a little bit extra.

You had 21 years' contributions plus 12 years' HRP. That adds up to 33 years, so you should certainly do a bit better.

jem16

sylviesinc wrote: »

Thanks for the reply patanne. I have 21 years contributions but I had child benefit from 1978 when HRP started to 1990 when I started full time work again so I wouldn't qualify for a full pension but maybe I will get a little bit extra.

The way it works is that HRP reduces the amount of contributions needed. So 39 years minus 12 years HRP leaves you 27 years needed for a full pension.

You will therefore be entitled to 21/27ths of a full pension which is £75.95 as opposed to the 21/39ths you get now which is £52.58.

sylviesinc

What surprises me is that I haven't read or heard anything about this but they must be sending out these letters to everyone who may qualify. They explained that their computer doesn't tell them whether or not I have children so there must be thousands or even tens of thousands of women receiving this letter. I wonder what date they brought in their new NI computer then?

Thanks for the calculation jem16 :-)

jem16

sylviesinc wrote: »

What surprises me is that I haven't read or heard anything about this but they must be sending out these letters to everyone who may qualify. They explained that their computer doesn't tell them whether or not I have children so there must be thousands or even tens of thousands of women receiving this letter. I wonder what date they brought in their new NI computer then?

They have been updating their systems to take into account the pension changes from April 2010 this year - this has been going on the last couple of years so don't know if it's related or not.

Thanks for the calculation jem16 :-)

Hopefully they are correct.