Marriage in retirement

jojorose

My partner and I took early retirement at the end of March. We married a fortnight ago.

He has a good pension as he was an ex steel worker. I have a lot of very small pots. My last stint in hellish employment was as a Civil Servant and whilst i attended the "Thinking of retiring (before everybody in this room) course" I forgot to ask about state pension. My partner is 60 and im 55. Obviously i was due to get my own pension have i sacrificed this? Will we both get a pension when he is 66 or will he get his and i get mine in 12 years?

Cant believe i forgot to check this out but I did!

jojo

hyubh

jojorose wrote: »

I forgot to ask about state pension. My partner is 60 and im 55. Obviously i was due to get my own pension have i sacrificed this?

No.

Will we both get a pension when he is 66 or will he get his and i get mine in 12 years?

You will each get your own at your own respective state pension ages.

xylophone

You can each get a new state pension statement.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/application-for-a-state-pension-statement

atush

and yes it was unfortunate to retire before you knew the answer to this. I suspect your pension age is close to 67, and that is when you will get it.

But you are young enough to get work part time to help out if you want to.

Triumph13

If either / both of you were contracted out for significant periods then there is a good chance that your state pensions will be based on the old £119 per week model not the new £155 pw single tier. It may therefore make a lot of sense to pay a few years of voluntary NIC contributions as, if your entitlement is currently less than the £155, each year of NICs buys you another £4.45 a week of pension - that's £231 a year of income (less any income tax) for a £733 contribution!

caveman8006

Out of interest, if you or your partner have a private DP pension that paid a widow/widowers pension, won't you be entitled to that now if you outlive your partner? Presumably anybody single could marry anyone at all when you are close to pegging out just to give them the benefit of the survivor's pension or is there some rule to stop that?

brewerdave

caveman8006 wrote: »

Out of interest, if you or your partner have a private DP pension that paid a widow/widowers pension, won't you be entitled to that now if you outlive your partner? Presumably anybody single could marry anyone at all when you are close to pegging out just to give them the benefit of the survivor's pension or is there some rule to stop that?

Assuming you mean a DB scheme, then the survivor's benefits are paid at the discretion of the trustees - if the "owner" of the pension filled out the appropriate expression of wishes form ,then promptly pegged it, I strongly suspect that the scheme would resist paying the widow/ers benefits !!:)

atush

I doubt that somehow- who are they going to give it to?

I think a lot of people dont fill out expressions of wishes and do so once they feel they are ill enough that they need to worry about it.

kidmugsy

OP, of you find yourself with income less than the Personal Allowance against income tax (£11k per annum), and your husband has an income greater than the PA, then you can transfer part of your unused PA to him, which will reduce his tax bill.

That way you'll have a larger household post-tax income.

If your income is less than the PA there is also an argument that if the two of you can afford it, you (OP) should contribute to a pension each year up to £2880 net.

molerat

caveman8006 wrote: »

Out of interest, if you or your partner have a private DP pension that paid a widow/widowers pension, won't you be entitled to that now if you outlive your partner? Presumably anybody single could marry anyone at all when you are close to pegging out just to give them the benefit of the survivor's pension or is there some rule to stop that?

There are some older pensions that will only pay reduced widow/er's amounts or base payments on certain years of service if marriage occurs after retirement.

jojorose

Thanks all.

I was so pleased to learn i will get my own pension and then as advised checked my pension statement which was much better than I had anticipated and the higher rate. In addition I transferred my tax allowance over too. Thanks to Xylophone, Kidmugsy for those pieces of info. Then Caveman - I asked the old man to name me on his pension.

Thank you so much all for your advice.

I forgot to ask the question at work because I was so delighted to get the confirmation that I could draw down my pathetically small pension pots as Id thought and I practically levitated out of that room on a high. That was enough to make the dream a reality and wave the finger at my employer so much sooner than Id anticipated.

Anything else is going to be a bonus.