Married couple pension

McKneff

Thank you Margaretclare, I knew or at least I was pretty sure I didn't imagine it. x


My mum and dad were born 1922 and 1916 respectively.
Annie

jem16

McKneff wrote: »

Thank you Margaretclare, I knew or at least I was pretty sure I didn't imagine it. x

A bit confused here McKneff - Margaretclare has confirmed that there is not, and never was, a Married Couples Pension no matter what age they are now. People always got their own pension.

The Married Couples Allowance, as I explained earlier in Post 7, is a tax allowance and has nothing to do with pensions.

seven-day-weekend

I can remember my mum, who didn't work outside the home after marriage, saying that my dad got extra on his Pension 'for her'. Looking back, she must have meant the married man's tax allowance. I assume she got her 60% pension in her own name, even though my dad used to cash everything together at the Post Office. They were born in 1904 and 1908.

My friend, who is five years older than me , she is 71 this year, also never accrued enough to get her full pension,despite working hard all her life, and was delighted when she was granted her 60%, she thought she would get nothing.

I'm glad to say I accrued 100%, through a combination of paying full stamp through employment, by having my qualifying years reduced by Home Responsibilities Protection (via Child Benefit) when I was not earning enough to pay NI, and by paying two years worth of Voluntary Contributions. I was also one of the last to be able to get it at 60, but needed to have (before the reduction) 39 years paid/credited.

Anyway, back on topic : I don't think there has ever been a married couples' pension, but if they qualify for means-tested Pension Credit this is calculated as a couple, so quite confusing.

zygurat789

There is no married man's pension but a married man on the basic pension can claim for a spouse as a dependent, there are conditions of course.
This could well be the extra your Dad had added to his pension for your Mum.

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/EIM74602.htm

noh

zygurat789 wrote: »

There is no married man's pension but a married man on the basic pension can claim for a spouse as a dependent, there are conditions of course.
This could well be the extra your Dad had added to his pension for your Mum.

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/EIM74602.htm

Was only available if the wife was below state pension age and not earning above a certain amount. It was abolished for new claimants in 2010.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/1631461

zygurat789

noh wrote: »

Was only available if the wife was below state pension age and not earning above a certain amount. It was abolished for new claimants in 2010.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/1631461

But it was the basis of the myth of the married man's pension.

JezR

For many years announcements of new basic state pension values would state two; one for a single person and the other for a married couple. This also perpetuated the concept of a 'married couple's pension' even though in reality the extra was simply 60% of the single rate, and could not take account of individual contribution circumstances.

One of the earliest who tried to dispel this concept was Ann Widdecombe in the 1990s, who when she was Under Secretary of State for Social Security. Whenever asked about a 'married couple's' rate in Parliament she would point out there was no such thing.

There certainly hasn't been one since the 1975 Act.