23 years abroad

pixie9

My new husband (married him in June 06) was out of the country for 23 years in South Africa. He did not keep up his National Insurance contributions during that time. What will happen when he is 65? He is now 50. His ex-wife, to whom he pays maintainance, is still in South Africa - she is 64. I have worked every day since I was 16 - now 52 - and have a couple of small private pensions, some equity in the flat we have bought together, and some savings. Our joint mortgage runs until he is 65 as he earns more than me. What is going to happen when he hits 65? Help anyone? Cheers

ReportInvestor

Hi pixie and welcome to the site .

If he also started work at 16 he would be entitled to 26/44 of the basic state pension entitlement if he continued working and paying NI contributions to 65.

He can write to ask to see his current entitlement.

See here for details and to print off a form

EdInvestor

The Government is about to change the regs so that only 30 years of contributions will be enough to claim the full state pension.

Presumably he had already clocked up around 10 years before he left. He can pay up at least 6 missing back years on a voluntary basis now, possibly a few more. He has 15 years from before retirement to pay more voluntary contributions ( or through his job) so that adds up to more than 30 in total . So looks like he will be fine, and he should get S2P for the next 15 years as well

You are already in the money under the new rules in your own right.

Get forecasts as above.

Divorcees are entitled to to a pension based on 100% of their ex-husband's contributions after he turns 65, IIRC.However she would not under current regs get this uprated for inflation annually, due to the discriminatory rules affecting Commonwealth countries :mad:

jennifernil

When does the 30 year rule come in?

EdInvestor

Planned for 2010. But watch for it in the next Queen's Speech as it needs leguislation, not yet a done deal.

Cook_County

1. Did he pay anything in SA at all on which he might claim benefits?
2. If your pensions are truly low (as they sound) you might want to plan to keep income low and arrange for pension credits instead of saving much more now, gien that current investment returns are not going to be incredible on the amounts you could afford to put into pension plans over the remainder of your working lives. I know this sounds perverse, but spending money now so you enjoy it and keeping the mortgage going after age 65 would - under present rules - give you much more in pension credits than you could hope for in additional pension income.

pixie9

Thanks for all your responses.

He started work at 16 in UK and went to SA when he was 23. By my reckoning he will be five years short of the 30 year minimum. How do we go about making up the shortfall? We are going to be poor old pensioners at this rate! I suppose they will take my piddly little private pensions (foolishy stopped paying - got about £30,000 in them I think) into account if we try to claim anything. What are pension credits? Sorry for the dumb questions. His ex-wife is 15 years older than him.

pixie9

And, no, he didnt pay into anything whilst in SA.

EdInvestor

If he's 50 now, he will pay 15 years to retirement. He can pay at least 6 back years now, possibly a couple more. Then he will have 7 years in the bag from before he left. I make that very close to 30.

Speak to the Pensions Service and get a forecast and also ask them to explain about the SERPS/S2P top-up.

BTW 30 years is planned to be the minimum for the full BSP. If you have a bit less than 30 years, you would just get a slightly smaller BSP.

IIRC if you have less than 10 years you can't claim any pension at all, but that may be changing along with the new 30 year rule.

CIS

10yrs is the minimum for a payable pension for a woman retiring after 39yrs, a man has a minimum of 11yrs, (excluding HRP)

EdInvestor

According to this article, at present due to a computer fault, you can pay back conts for 10 years not 6.So that should mean he'll have no problem gettting the full 30 years.

BTW, if you are working abroad since c.1990 you can pay voluntary class 11, which are much cheaper than voluntary class 111 conts for the same benefits.

You might want to check if he can pay the more recent conts at the class 11 rate, which also applies to people in the UK who are self employed.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/93e9606e-5522-11db-acba-0000779e2340.html