Will early payment of pension affect ESA?

ChrisJJ

Hi All,

Just received an update today on a tiny pension from a job I had over 23 years ago. I was in the job for about three years. I've been unable to work for a very long time due to M.E, and have therefore been on benefits. At the moment I'm on ESA (Support Group) and receive PIP due to my disability.

I've been looking into requesting early payment of this pension on ill health grounds. This would bring in the princely sum of £600 per year. I'm just wondering if this will affect my ESA in any way? I'm thinking it probably would, that my ESA will be reduced by the amount I get from the pension, but thought I'd post here to see if any wise forumsters know more than I do.

Thanks in advance

TELLIT01

If you are on Contributions based ESA your money won't be affected by the £12 per week pension. If you are on Income based then it will be reduced £ for £. In other words your ESA will go down by £12 per week.
Safest way forward is to let ESA know once you have actually received a letter from the pension provider with exact detaily.

pmlindyloo

It might be worth investigating whether the pension can be taken as a lump sum. If you are on income based ESA then you can have capital up to £6000 without it affecting your benefits.

TELLIT01

pmlindyloo wrote: »

It might be worth investigating whether the pension can be taken as a lump sum. If you are on income based ESA then you can have capital up to £6000 without it affecting your benefits.

Certainly worth investigating, but as a typical pension pays between 4% & 5% of the pot each year I suspect the total value with be much higher than £6k even allowing for an increased payment on the basis of poor health.

ChrisJJ

Thanks for your responses. I will check if the pension is payable as a lump sum. I don't like the thought of benefits being messed around with, so if I'll be no better off, I may as well leave it. There's no guarantee they'd agree to pay it anyway, despite my having not worked for so long and highly unlikely I'll ever be able to work again.

Thanks again for taking the time to reply! :beer: