State Pension and COPE

RD42

Hi All,

I am trying to work out if I will get a full state pension, any input appreciated, I am Male, born in 1974 (47 Years Old).

From Gov.UK website after I log in:

You can get your State Pension on XX YYY 2041. Your forecast is:  £179.60 a week, £780.94 a month, £9,371.27 a year

My NI Record:

You have:

• 28 years of full contributions
• 20 years to contribute before 5 April 2041
• 3 years when you did not contribute enough

Contracted Out Pension Equivalent (COPE)

Your COPE estimate is£36.07 a week.

So I want to confirm:

1. I would need another 6 years of contributions to to qualify for the current full state pension
2. This would not be affected by stopping work after the final 6 years are paid in
3. Or any other factors (Outside of changes to rules/regulations made by future governments).
4. Would the "Contracted out" part be deducted from the state pension forecast?  (i.e. £179.60 per week - £36.07) ?

Thanks for your advice.

Dazed_and_C0nfused

1.  As you haven't provided the amount accrued to date (which is included on the forecast) it's impossible to say.

2.  If you do reach £179.60 no.

3.  Anything could change.

4.  No, why do you even think that is possible?

jimi_man

RD42 said:

Hi All,

I am trying to work out if I will get a full state pension, any input appreciated, I am Male, born in 1974 (47 Years Old).

From Gov.UK website after I log in:

You can get your State Pension on XX YYY 2041. Your forecast is:  £179.60 a week, £780.94 a month, £9,371.27 a year

My NI Record:

You have:

• 28 years of full contributions
• 20 years to contribute before 5 April 2041
• 3 years when you did not contribute enough

Contracted Out Pension Equivalent (COPE)

Your COPE estimate is£36.07 a week.

So I want to confirm:

1. I would need another 6 years of contributions to to qualify for the current full state pension
2. This would not be affected by stopping work after the final 6 years are paid in
3. Or any other factors (Outside of changes to rules/regulations made by future governments).
4. Would the "Contracted out" part be deducted from the state pension forecast?  (i.e. £179.60 per week - £36.07) ?

Thanks for your advice.

Hi

1. How would it be six years? You've unfortunately missed out the crucial bit of information on your forecast where it says 'You need to continue to contribute NI to reach your forecast' and the 'Estimate based on contributions to 5th April 2021'. That will tell you how much you need to make up and the number of years below it.

2.If it is indeed six years, but yes that's correct. Once you've reached the max that's it.

3. Who knows!!!!

4. No, you can ignore this. 

molerat

RD42 said:

1. Would the "Contracted out" part be deducted from the state pension forecast?  (i.e. £179.60 per week - £36.07) ?

Why would it ?

Contracted Out Pension Equivalent (COPE)

Your COPE estimate is £x.xx a week.

This will not affect your State Pension forecast. The COPE amount is paid as part of your other pension schemes, not by the government.

jamesd

There's no way for us to tell whether 6 more years are needed because the key information about current value and how many years it says are needed is not present. If it says 6 years that will be right but it's possible that the gain for the final year will be too small to matter. Normally someone here would tell you how much the final year would get you to help you decide if it's worth getting.

Once you reach the maximum single tier state pension it doesn't matter whether you work or buy more years, it'll make no more difference.

No other factor based on what you've written, unless you mean things like credits for childcare or being unemployed and seeking work.

The COPE isn't deducted. It's an estimate of what a certain type of defined benefit pension might include based on the rebates it received as a result of it having its members contracted out of most of the earnings-related part of the pre-2016 state pension. Some people will have paid lower NI instead. Others will have contracted out themselves into an investment-based pension. In those cases there will be no extra non-state pension (lower NI case) or an investment performance based one. For your state pension you can just ignore COPE because all numbers already include the effect of having been contacted out in the amounts and number of years to go.

RD42

Thanks all, in answer to a couple of points raised in comments:

1) Guess this is the missing info:

Estimate based on your National Insurance record up to 5 April 2021 : £151.58 a week

Forecast if you contribute another 6 years before 5 April 2041: £179.60 a week

£179.60 is the most you can get

You cannot improve your forecast any further, unless you choose to put off claiming.

4)
To me the statement made on the Gov site:

"This will not affect your State Pension forecast."

Could be interpreted to mean that the forcecast system does not take COPE into account, which could mean it still has an affect on my final pension. Pleased to understand that it will not.

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My thoughts were that perhaps the years where I was contracted out would somehow not count in full towards getting the maximum pension, so i might need to plan to contribute past the normal 35 years, to ensure I had 35 years where I had not been contracted out.  Glad this is not the case!

p00hsticks

RD42 said:

My thoughts were that perhaps the years where I was contracted out would somehow not count in full towards getting the maximum pension, so i might need to plan to contribute past the normal 35 years, to ensure I had 35 years where I had not been contracted out. 

They sort of do and sort of don't - it's complicated. Basically anyone who started work prior to 2016 is on transitional terms and may need more or less than 35 years to reach the maximum amount depending on their individual circumstances (mainly whether they were contracted in or out and what additional state pension they had accrued prior to the introduction of the new State Pension. (As an example, I'll need 44 years, although the last one will only get me an extra 80p a week so I probably won't bother making contributions for that year).

Silvertabby

p00hsticks said:

RD42 said:

My thoughts were that perhaps the years where I was contracted out would somehow not count in full towards getting the maximum pension, so i might need to plan to contribute past the normal 35 years, to ensure I had 35 years where I had not been contracted out. 

They sort of do and sort of don't - it's complicated. Basically anyone who started work prior to 2016 is on transitional terms and may need more or less than 35 years to reach the maximum amount depending on their individual circumstances (mainly whether they were contracted in or out and what additional state pension they had accrued prior to the introduction of the new State Pension. (As an example, I'll need 44 years, although the last one will only get me an extra 80p a week so I probably won't bother making contributions for that year).

.....and in my case I needed 48 years to qualify for the full single tier pension next year.

4 of those years were covered by voluntary Class 3s.  The 4th year will give me an extra £4.86 per week (£5.13 for a full year) so obviously went for it.  

MallyGirl

I was contracted out but I still have 36 years of full contribution and cannot improve my pension further:

£183.25 is the most you can get

You cannot improve your forecast any more.

So it looks like the transitional rules worked in my favour as I still have 13 years before my state pension kicks in.

molerat

MallyGirl said:

I was contracted out but I still have 36 years of full contribution and cannot improve my pension further:

£183.25 is the most you can get

You cannot improve your forecast any more.

So it looks like the transitional rules worked in my favour as I still have 13 years before my state pension kicks in.

Does your forecast state you were contracted out and is there a COPE amount shown ?

MallyGirl

yep

Contracted Out Pension Equivalent (COPE)

Your COPE estimate is£31.75 a week.