Friend is worried about claiming pension

charlybarly

I will try and keep this short. A friend of mine (yes, really!) is worrying himself sick about a pension problem.
His first wife died from cancer aged just 29 and when she passed away my friend qualified to claim part of her pension. A number of years later he re-married. A few weeks ago he got a letter with a form. He was asked to sign the form and return it, to declare that he was single. He only discovered when he got the letter that he stopped qualifying for the pension when he re-married.
So in effect he has been claiming this money for nine years when he shouldn't have. He has no problem with this, and is perfectly willing to pay back anything he owes (he reckons it's about £9000), but id worried that this amounts to fraud and he may get taken to court. He has no intention of lying on the form or trying to evade this repayment, but is hesitant to take the next step.
I have advised that he seek legal advice to help determine his best way of moving forward.
Does anyone have any comment or advice on how I can help him. He is 57 and has never been in trouble with the law, and he doesn't want to start now.

Loughton_Monkey

If we assume (a) that he was indeed single when he started claiming the pension soon after his first wife died, and (b) the recent letter has (so far) not been signed and returned, and (c) he has not signed any other letters in the last 9 years..... then this is the 'ideal' time to plead ignorance, and own up to not knowing that he should have told them if/when he got married.

Almost certainly they would take no action other than to determine the facts and have him repay the overpayment. I suspect that the original claim forms set out clearly that he should inform them if/when he remarries. Any passive, 'negligent' failure to do so would be very difficult (I think) to persue in the courts as 'fraud'.

Of course if he signs this letter, and/or has signed others in the past, then technically that could be seen as fraud.

All pension companies write to claimants on a regular basis. Primarily this is to ensure that the claimant hasn't died and that relatives are simply trousering the money. When such payment is also conditional upon being single, then to sign a bit of paper that clearly asks you to declare any marriage could hardly be called 'forgetfulness' or 'ignorance'.

charlybarly

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Your reasoning makes a lot of sense.

I am sure that in the small print of the original documents concerning the pension would have mentioned the re-marrying aspect and I suspect my friend may be guilty of not reading them fully. He only mentioned the whole affair to me today so I need to study all his paperwork on this to get a complete picture.

I think he will be calmed a little by your views, and I hope that together we can get through this tricky situation.

wakeupalarm

You say he is 57 now and has received pension for 9 years, which means he received pension at age 48? Who pays pension at 48, Military/Police???
Did he start receiving the pension before he re-married or after?

molerat

It will be a widow/ers pension which will usually be paid from death irrespective of age to help replace the lost family income from the spouse, op says he has been receiving the pension for many years but only re-married 9 years ago.

charlybarly

He started receiving the pension immediately upon his first wife's death.
I am not certain of the timeline but he did not re-marry for at least ten years.

xylophone

Your friend has a form to complete - obviously he must complete it honestly.

Will there not be an addition to the "Are you single" question along the lines of "If you have answered no to this question, please state date of remarriage?"

He has no option but to state the facts and explain his mistake?

Shimrod

charlybarly wrote: »

I think he will be calmed a little by your views, and I hope that together we can get through this tricky situation.

I'm a pension trustee, and we come across situations like this occasionally. Once we have been notified (or find out) that a pension should no longer be in payment, the first thing that happens is the pension payment is stopped.

Beyond that, once we have determined the amount of overpayment, a payment plan would hopefully be agreed that everyone is happy with. We would only resort to legal matters to recover money as a last recourse, as that is expensive. As long as your friend is prepared to pay the money back I wouldn't expect there to be an issue.

charlybarly

xylophone - I've known this guy for 53 years since we were at primary school together - we are best mates and we have no secrets, he knows more about me than anyone, more than anyone in my family,and it the same with him, I know he would never tell anything but the truth when filling in the form - he will return the form correctly filled in, and I understand he has to provide his marriage certificate, so there's no problem in that area.

shimrod - thanks for that clarification - what you tell me is pretty much what I said was likely to happen, although I was only using my common sense, not any prior knowledge of pensions.

atush

he will just have to refund. Unless he signed a form saying he wasn't married, when he was, I don't see a problem here.


Just tell him to fill out the form (make a copy) and send it in.

molerat

There is an outside possibility that he may not have to pay this back but that all depends on what information was received when the pension was started and what steps the pension have taken since payments began to ascertain if there had been any relevant change in circumstances that would affect the payments especially as he is a third party to the pension. He needs to fill in the form honestly and wait for them to get back to him. He also needs to gather together any paperwork he has ever received about the pension and see if there is any mention of the clause. I know my annual newsletter always has a paragraph about change of circumstances in it somewhere. If they do insist on repayment then an informal chat with TPAS may be worth it.