National Insurance Contributions and State Pension

No1poolerfan

[FONT=&quot]Hi

Can you help my wife and myself?

My wife is 59 (born on 7 April 1954) and is badly affected by the Governments decision to raise the retirement age for women.

The plan all along was for her to retire at age 60 when I would be 65 and we would both get our state pension. She will now not get hers until a least 65!! She still want to retire at age 60 mainly due to the stresses and strains of her present job in the NHS. She will get get works pension with the NHS but not a full one as she did not work in her early days of our marriage as she was bringing up our 3 children.

If she does retire next April when she is 60, will she still get her National Insurance contributions paid until she gets her state pension. When I reached aged 60 I stopped paying National Insurance contributions as the Government paid them after then. ( I then took retirement at age 60 from work as I had paid into my works pension for over 40 years)

I hope all this makes sense and you can advise me over my wife's National Insurance Contributions and how this will affect her state pension?

Thank you


[/FONT]

McKneff

She would need to know how many years contributions she has already, at the moment the requirement is 30 years but this is soon to become 35 so I presume she will come into this bracket.

And if she reitres at 60, she wont get NI credits unless she claims JSA and actually goes job seeking.
She will be retiring from choice.

I don't understand you saying the government paid your NI to be honest. Although I think at that time people
only paid National Insurance Contributions only up to the age of 60 and then none was paid at all. I think this may have been the case, rather than you thinking that the government paid them.

If she rings the dWP up, they will tell her how many years contributions she has up to date.

CLAPTON

No1poolerfan wrote: »

[FONT=&quot]Hi

Can you help my wife and myself?

My wife is 59 (born on 7 April 1954) and is badly affected by the Governments decision to raise the retirement age for women.

The plan all along was for her to retire at age 60 when I would be 65 and we would both get our state pension. She will now not get hers until a least 65!! She still want to retire at age 60 mainly due to the stresses and strains of her present job in the NHS. She will get get works pension with the NHS but not a full one as she did not work in her early days of our marriage as she was bringing up our 3 children.

If she does retire next April when she is 60, will she still get her National Insurance contributions paid until she gets her state pension. When I reached aged 60 I stopped paying National Insurance contributions as the Government paid them after then. ( I then took retirement at age 60 from work as I had paid into my works pension for over 40 years)

I hope all this makes sense and you can advise me over my wife's National Insurance Contributions and how this will affect her state pension?

Thank you


[/FONT]

the increase in women's retirement age to bring it in line with men was announced in the 1990s so she has had plenty of time to plan for it.


she will need 35 years of NI contributions to get the full state pension : has she got a pension forecast?
if she has worked or being bring up children she probably has sufficient contributions as she would qualify for home responsibility credits.

CLAPTON

McKneff wrote: »

She would need to know how many years contributions she has already, at the moment the requirement is 30 years but this is soon to become 35 so I presume she will come into this bracket.

And if she reitres at 60, she wont get NI credits unless she claims JSA and actually goes job seeking.
She will be retiring from choice.

I don't understand you saying the government paid your NI to be honest. Although I think at that time people
only paid National Insurance Contributions only up to the age of 60 and then none was paid at all. I think this may have been the case, rather than you thinking that the government paid them.

If she rings the dWP up, they will tell her how many years contributions she has up to date.

men, at age 60 did indeed gain NI credits even if they were not working and not looking for a job (helped to massage the unemployment figures )
no idea if this is still true

JezR

The crediting scheme you are remembering only applied to men. It gave men if not working an automatic National Insurance credit in any tax year that a woman of the same age would get State Pension. By definition this can't apply to a woman, and ceases in any case with pension age equalisation.

xylophone

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/181237/single-tier-pension-fact-sheet.pdf might be worth a look.

https://www.gov.uk/state-pension-statement

McKneff

What year did the home responsibilities credit come in.

I dint qualify for them, I am 64

Annie

JezR

McKneff wrote: »

What year did the home responsibilities credit come in.

I dint qualify for them, I am 64

6 April 1978

p00hsticks

CLAPTON wrote: »

the increase in women's retirement age to bring it in line with men was announced in the 1990s so she has had plenty of time to plan for it.

Sort of. While you are correct in saying that the legislation to gradually bring the state pension age for women in line with that of men was originally announced in the 1990s, the speed at whch that is being done was increased rapidly as a result of some legislation not introduced until 2011, which has affected women born in 1953 and 1954 (like the OPs wife) particularly harshly. It is quite possible that this further change may have increased her pension age by eighteen months (down from a couple of years after some vigourous campaigning) at very short notice.

http://www.ageuk.org.uk/money-matters/pensions/changes-to-state-pension-age/

Jazzer

I hope someone out there can help because I find the situation with National Insurance confusing and the government site does not make it much clearer. I am nearing state pension age and, naturally, want to maximise what receive. I am at present 61 and have been self-employed for most of my working life, 38 years, and have always paid Class 2 NICs. My accountant has told me I should not have paid contributions once I turned 60. Is this correct? If I don't continue to pay contributions will I get a full state pension? Can I reclaim the 15 months contributions I may have wrongly paid? Thanks.

noh

Your accountant is incorrect.
If you are below state retirement age and still self employed with sufficent earnings then you are required to pay class 2 contributions.
The information on the HMRC website is clear.
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/working/intro/class2.htm#5