Teacher's Additional Pension

tonymus

Hi there,

I was wondering if anyone could advise on a problem my wife is having with payments to her Teacher's Additional Pension?

TAP is a way of bumping up your pension by buying additional payments of £250 per year by having deductions made from your salary. You can buy as many £250 additions as you need, so, for example, if you bought five you would have an additional pension of £1250 per annum on top of your standard pension.

The problem we are having is that the amount you pay for these extras can change. My wife was having £141 per month deducted from her pay, she has now been told this should have been £162 since 2013. She has found a letter that was sent in 2013 that tells her about this increase, but it says she has to do nothing as the increase will be notified to her pay department by Teacher's Pensions. As a caveat, it says that if the increase does not get implemented, she should contact either her pay section or Teacher's Pensions.

Teacher's Pensions are now asking for the arrears to be paid, although I should point out that this is a voluntary scheme. I estimate the arrears due will be over £1200.

Now, as far as I am concerned, there has obviously been a !!!!-up between the two departments that should have sorted this out back in 2013, and they should be responsible for at least some if not all of the arrears now being credited. Although the original letter does say that my wife should check that this increase in payment had been implemented, I'm pretty certain that I have read somewhere in the last couple of years that putting something like this in a letter to shift the onus of a mistake to the customer rather than the people who have messed it up is illegal. Can anyone confirm this, and, if so, can either the pay section or Teacher's Pensions be made to credit these arrears without my wife paying them?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Dazed_and_confused

Not sure if you are being serious?

I would have said the most your wife can realistically hope for is a bit of time to make the payment of the arrears. Has a plan/timesxale been suggested?

Or maybe she could give up whatever additional pension this amount was purchasing?

At the end of the day the extra money is in her bank account. She just needs to pass it on to the pension scheme.

Brynsam

tonymus wrote: »

Now, as far as I am concerned, there has obviously been a !!!!-up between the two departments that should have sorted this out back in 2013, and they should be responsible for at least some if not all of the arrears now being credited. Although the original letter does say that my wife should check that this increase in payment had been implemented, I'm pretty certain that I have read somewhere in the last couple of years that putting something like this in a letter to shift the onus of a mistake to the customer rather than the people who have messed it up is illegal. Can anyone confirm this, and, if so, can either the pay section or Teacher's Pensions be made to credit these arrears without my wife paying them?

Mistakes happen, annoying as it is. The onus has not been shifted on to your wife, but quite reasonably the letter asked her to check.

Your wife has suffered no financial loss, nor has she relied on any information supplied by Teachers' Pensions to take irrevocable decisions. She has had the benefit of extra funds in her account and is only being asked to pay the original sums due (i.e. she hasn't been charged interest). It would be entirely reasonable to ask for some time to pay if she can't find that sort of cash all in one go.