Full state pensions for "stay at home mothers"

McKneff

gadgetmind wrote: »

Online state pensions are currently disabled for most people, including myself and spouse. Oddly, it still works for some and I haven't worked out the pattern.



This is for my wife. She's at 26 years of NICs and is using class 2 (cheaper than class 3!) to earn the missing years.

If she won't need the extra years due to HRP and new rules, then we'll stop paying immediately and see what we can claim back!

Dont think you can claim NI back unfortunately.

gadgetmind

McKneff wrote: »

Dont think you can claim NI back unfortunately.

Ultimately that's for a court to decide.

wakeupalarm

margaretclare wrote: »

I don't know about 30 years, but since April 1978 it has no longer been possible for a married woman to 'opt out' of paying full NI contributions, by opting to pay what was euphemistically called the 'small stamp' or the 'married women's reduced contribution'. This means that there are still women who made that choice, who are newly-retired or still coming up to retirement, who can only get 60% of what their husband gets and only then when he retires. Not in her own right, in other words.

However, since that change in 1978 and a further change in April 1990 when the principle of separate taxation was introduced, it has been established that a woman should have her own money and not be dependent on her husband, which was the principle for many centuries before that.

If the change happened in 1978, 34 years ago, does that mean there are no woman under the age of 50 who have paid the reduced stamp, and only those over 50 are likely to have been penelised by the reduced stamp? So this proposal would only effect those women between the ages 50-62 as those older then 62(currently) wont be part of the new universal pension.

bilbo51

gadgetmind wrote: »

Online state pensions are currently disabled for most people, including myself and spouse.

Same for me but I telephoned them instead, using the number on that page. All done in 5 minutes and I'm to expect the forecast in the post in 10 days...

gadgetmind

bilbo51 wrote: »

Same for me but I telephoned them instead, using the number on that page. All done in 5 minutes and I'm to expect the forecast in the post in 10 days...

I can't decide whether to bother. It's going to be an "old system" forecast so not too much use.

However, I've had forecasts for both of us done every May for the last few years, and have them all on file, so it would seem a shame to have a gap in my collection.

jamesd

If you've changed from contracted out to contracted in it might be useful to get an up to date Additional State Pension forecast based on the current rules to compare with what any new rules provide.

gadgetmind

jamesd wrote: »

If you've changed from contracted out to contracted in.

We did, but seven years ago.

Of course, it remains to be seen what impact our contracted out years will have on the £140 pw "flat rate" pension.

p00hsticks

gadgetmind wrote: »

Online state pensions are currently disabled for most people, including myself and spouse. Oddly, it still works for some and I haven't worked out the pattern.

I think they've stopped the online forecasting if you are due to retire after 6th April 2015, as all the rules are up in the air after this point and the forecast you would get could be misleading....

SnowMan

p00hsticks wrote: »

I think they've stopped the online forecasting if you are due to retire after 6th April 2015, as all the rules are up in the air after this point and the forecast you would get could be misleading....

I got a 'state pension statement' about 2 months ago. That is what they call it when you are not able to get a 'state pension forecast' because you are not old enough.

It seems to be the 'statement' is based purely on the qualifying credits to date. So if you have 28 years credits at the moment but are almost certain to exceed 30 years for a full state pension what they show on the 'statement for basic state pension is 28/30 x the current basis state pension amount plus an additional state pension (presumably based on accrued entitlement and current rules).

I always think the important step (usually missed) is to ring them up after getting the forecast/statement to find out precisely which qualifying years you have or which years you haven't got credits for.


I don't really see the point in speculating too much until we have seen the white paper which is now due in the next few weeks supposedly. All we have to go on at the moment that I am aware of is what we've read in the green paper, the comments in the budget statement and what Ian Duncan Smith has said recently.

However as the new state pension is based on supposedly purely individual entitlement then it will be interesting to see how they treat women who have being paying reduced rate NI or those who are relying on the dependant's pension due to few qualifying years.

As someone with quite a few self-employment years where I wasn't earning additional State Pension, I will be interested to see how I am affected.

margaretclare

wakeupalarm wrote: »

If the change happened in 1978, 34 years ago, does that mean there are no woman under the age of 50 who have paid the reduced stamp, and only those over 50 are likely to have been penalised by the reduced stamp? So this proposal would only affect those women between the ages 50-62 as those older then 62(currently) wont be part of the new universal pension.

Not quite, unfortunately. The change in April 1978 applied to any woman who got married after that date. Anyone who was already paying the reduced stamp and didn't want to change it, was allowed to continue. Therefore, HRP for staying at home and looking after children/elderly/disabled did not apply to those who continued, also SERPS/S2P did not apply to them either. So, as you can see, there are still women not yet retired, or only recently retired, who are stuck with retiring when their husband reaches 65 and they get 60% of what he gets from his contribution record and not their own.

I think it was too much of a political 'hot potato' to make it obligatory for all women after that date to pay full contributions, which is what some of us in the women's movement at the time thought should happen.