Disputed pension contributions

craobhan

Hi, I work for the local council and am about to take early retirement.
I have been in dispute over missing contributions in the past and the last position a couple of years ago was that they now accepted that contributions were made from 3 February 1985. This still leaves 4 months missing which now are more important than ever given that I'm expected to sign on the dotted line pdq.
What happened was this;
I began work on 1 October 1984 as a temporary relief employee straight from college. I should not have been paying into the pension fund as back then relief staff had no pension or holiday benefits. However finance dept. made an error and took the payments.
I was that naive I didn't know what "super ann." was only that it was a deduction and I went to my boss and asked him what it was for. He explained it to me and told me not to bother asking for the amount back as he had me earmarked for a Manpower Services contract in 3 months time and he reckoned it would take finance that long to actually sort their mistake. He said just leave it as it will count towards your pension in the long run.
I haven't got either a payslip or a P60 from almost 29 years ago; I keep mine for 7 years back and the pensions team attitude is that they don't have paperwork to support the missing 4 months so it's up to me to prove it. I have found out that HMRC will not provide a duplicate P60 from that far back.
I have been advised that the council's previous system only has records back to the early 1990's.
Surely there has to be a record in the council's financial system somewhere, even if it's on paper or are they allowed to bin things that old? What can I do to get evidence to prove my case?

dunstonh

I haven't got either a payslip or a P60 from almost 29 years ago; I keep mine for 7 years back and the pensions team attitude is that they don't have paperwork to support the missing 4 months so it's up to me to prove it.

UK law does put the onus on the one making the allegation to provide the evidence to support it.

or are they allowed to bin things that old?

Yes they are.

What can I do to get evidence to prove my case?

If you failed to keep copies of your records and they have no copies then its game over. Realistically, any action you take against them could also be statute barred as well as you not having evidence.

Have you checked the date of membership on the council scheme?

zygurat789

craobhan wrote: »

Hi, I work for the local council and am about to take early retirement.
I have been in dispute over missing contributions in the past and the last position a couple of years ago was that they now accepted that contributions were made from 3 February 1985. This still leaves 4 months missing which now are more important than ever given that I'm expected to sign on the dotted line pdq.
What happened was this;
I began work on 1 October 1984 as a temporary relief employee straight from college. I should not have been paying into the pension fund as back then relief staff had no pension or holiday benefits. However finance dept. made an error and took the payments.
I was that naive I didn't know what "super ann." was only that it was a deduction and I went to my boss and asked him what it was for. He explained it to me and told me not to bother asking for the amount back as he had me earmarked for a Manpower Services contract in 3 months time and he reckoned it would take finance that long to actually sort their mistake. He said just leave it as it will count towards your pension in the long run.
I haven't got either a payslip or a P60 from almost 29 years ago; I keep mine for 7 years back and the pensions team attitude is that they don't have paperwork to support the missing 4 months so it's up to me to prove it. I have found out that HMRC will not provide a duplicate P60 from that far back.
I have been advised that the council's previous system only has records back to the early 1990's.
Surely there has to be a record in the council's financial system somewhere, even if it's on paper or are they allowed to bin things that old? What can I do to get evidence to prove my case?

Back then there wasn't the general understanding of pensions that there is now, and that's not great. Your boss may have told you this but did he have the power to overrule a general employment condition?
We are all getting older and as we do our memories become less reliable, it is possible that this was sorted out and refunded to you all those years ago, after all you don't have the paperwor to prove it wasn't.
I calculate that if you were given these four months it would benefit you by a net £7.72 per month for every £10,000 of pension you receive, index linked, of course and any lump sum would be 1.158% larger.

craobhan

dunstonh wrote: »

Have you checked the date of membership on the council scheme?

This all came to light a couple of years ago when they were first looking for ERVS volunteers. I made an enquiry but it wasn't financially worth it. It was the statement at that time that made me think something wasn't right as it was expressed in years/days under each of the schemes and it didn't add up. Enquiries established that they had 3 different start dates for me.

All I now have is a copy of my new contract from 1996 - we all got one as the council moved from regionalisation to unitary authority and changed its name. It states that my dates for a) length of service and b) employment benefits are both October 1984. Pensions won't accept this.

As part of my correspondence with them, they sent me copies of forms I had filled in stating that these proved their case and that there was no mention by me of the period 1/10/84 to 3/02/85. There was! I wrote back to them and asked so what's that then? Their reply was that it wasn't the right sort of form.

I also have a letter from the early 1990's from the then Head of Personnel. I had been promoted and when my new contract arrived it had the wrong start date etc. on it. I wrote to him saying I accepted on the T&Cs given apart from that one and gave the correct date. His reply confirmed that it had been checked and would be corrected. Oh how I wish I had written the word "pension" in that letter, I only pointed out the error in the start date and already accrued annual leave entitlement. Pensions wasn't mentioned in the contract or I would have spotted this. The council didn't produce annual pension forecasts back then either so I just assumed that if they got my start date right, they'd get everything else right too. When the new 1996 contract arrived it seemed to me to confirm that they had got it right. But pensions say no.

craobhan

zygurat789 wrote: »

Back then there wasn't the general understanding of pensions that there is now, and that's not great. Your boss may have told you this but did he have the power to overrule a general employment condition?
We are all getting older and as we do our memories become less reliable, it is possible that this was sorted out and refunded to you all those years ago, after all you don't have the paperwor to prove it wasn't.
I calculate that if you were given these four months it would benefit you by a net £7.72 per month for every £10,000 of pension you receive, index linked, of course and any lump sum would be 1.158% larger.

:-) I can actually remember exactly what my boss said at the time and the part about it taking finance that length of time to sort their mistake is not suitable to put on a public forum. He also told me that 1 October was a very auspicious date to start work as back then our annual leave year ran from 1 October to 30 September. Lord know why that was, as for some years now it has been 1 January to 31 December.

mrschaucer

If your 1996 contract states length of service and benefits dates are both from Oct 1984, then it's not your argument: it's one bit of the company disagreeing with the pensions people. Someone high up needs to knock together the heads of the people in HR and Pensions and get something sorted for you. I wouldn't be signing anything yet.

craobhan

Do either of you know if I have the right to accept their current offer on a "without prejudice" basis? If so, then I would just go asap. A union rep. suggested a couple of months ago that I would be supported in taking this forward if I still can't get it solved by myself. What is the length of time before I would be statute barred?

mrschaucer

Can't help, I'm afraid, but try the Employment thread where there's a retired employment solicitor who might advise? (lazy daisy I think.)

dunstonh

The only problem with using the employment date is that many people were not eligible to join the scheme for x number of months after employment began. There is also the possibility of opt out with later join. So, date of employment is not reliable for measuring date of membership of the scheme.

craobhan

What's puzzling me though is why then would the updated contract issued on council changeover not say a) Oct 84 and b) Feb 85? It has Oct 84 in both places.

jem16

craobhan wrote: »

What's puzzling me though is why then would the updated contract issued on council changeover not say a) Oct 84 and b) Feb 85? It has Oct 84 in both places.

Your employment contract and pension membership are 2 separate things. You didn't have to be a member of the pension and in certain cases ( and you admit you were one of them) you were not eligible to join.

Unless you can prove membership of the pension scheme, you're not going to get anywhere with this.

How much of a difference to your pension do you expect the 4 months to make?