Trying to contact the Future Pension Centre is very painfull !

molerat

Pat38493 said:

mikewill34 said:

p00hsticks said:

mikewill34 said:

My wife has been trying to get in touch with the Future Pension Centre since yesterday with abosolutely NO LUCK.

Each time she phones, she has to go through the menu then wait a few seconds then gets diconnected.

Assuming that she's phoning them to ask what years she needs to buy to boost her pension, then if she has already obtained a state pension forecast, get her to post the details up here and people will probably be able to tell her just the same as the Future Pension Centre would. 

I am NOT going to post personal details here.
Yes I agree that the FPC will probably say exactly to same as that on the State Pension Forecast pages.

HOWEVER I can't find any means or instructions on how to pay AVCs

Everyone else is posting their details here - obviously not their real name or NI number but they are posting the sections which says what the pension entitlement is and the details below which shows how many years you would still need to get the full pension.

Also are you aware the deadline has been extended to July even though the website is not updated accordingly?

Others have said it's best to call at 8am - you will probably still have a long wait but much shorter than later in the day.  

Also it will be dire the next few days because since the web site still says the deadline is this week, there will be many people trying desperately to get through.

I think we have another forum glitch, a few posts have been replying to old posts in a thread that have a few pages of replies after them

Rimlog

molerat said:

Rimlog said:

I would be very grateful if some of the experts here can please look my numbers and advise which National Insurance gaps it makes sense for me to fill.  I also have found the Future Pensions Centre impossible to contact.

I will be 66 on June 6th 2023.

My pension forecast says:
    Estimate based on your NI Record to 5th April 2022 £141.91
    Forecast if you contribute until 5th April 2023 £147.20
    £147.20 is the most you can get

I am retired from paid work.

My National Insurance record shows:
- 38 years of full contributions
- 1 year to contribute before 5 April 2023
- 11 years when you did not contribute enough

Summary of national insurance history:

Full year, for all years from 1975/6 to 2008/9 except for 1976/7 and 1977/8
Not full 2009/10, 2010/11, 2011/12
Full year, 2012/3 through to 2015/6
Not full thereafter.

I spoke to DWP.  They gave me a payment code, and told me the gaps that I am able to fill, as follows:
2009/10 £824.20
2010/11 £824.20
2011/12 £126.80

2016/17 £824.20
2017/18 £824.20
2018/19 £824.20
2019/20 £824.20
2020/21 £795.60
2021/22 £800.80

They made it clear that some of these gap payments would not affect my pension, but they were unable to advise which ones.

Thanks in advance, anyone who is able to help

Strange that DWP could not tell you which years would add to your pension, are you sure that was not HMRC as they are the ones that give you a payment code ?

Are you getting those payment figures from your on line tax account as the pension amounts you have quoted do not make sense unless you have been self employed and not been paying class 2 and those gap years are showing as "checking" - is that the case ?

With 38 pre 2016 years only years from 2016-17 and onwards will add to your pension.  You need 9 years to reach the maximum but you cannot do that  as there are only 7 available to you which will take you to £178.94.

Wow, that was quick.  Thank you - really appreciated.

I queued for a long time, using one of the numbers on the page which showed my pension forecast.  The lady told me that I needed to speak to the Future Pensions Centre for the information, and when I asked "Who are you with?" she said DWP.  Perhaps the Future Pensions Centre are a specialist unit of DWP?

Yes, I was self employed and not paying class 2 - I was fairly ignorant of the system.  The forecast does not show "checking", just "not full".

Based on what you say, I will pay the years from 2016/7 onwards.

You guys are doing a great job, helping to fill the gap left by the government here.  I am quite lucky, in that getting these payments wrong would not be life-changing, but many who need every penny, and who are not fortunate enough to stumble on these forums will end up losing or wasting money.  I think this is likely to become a big public scandal soon.

molerat

Rimlog said:

molerat said:

Rimlog said:

I would be very grateful if some of the experts here can please look my numbers and advise which National Insurance gaps it makes sense for me to fill.  I also have found the Future Pensions Centre impossible to contact.

I will be 66 on June 6th 2023.

My pension forecast says:
    Estimate based on your NI Record to 5th April 2022 £141.91
    Forecast if you contribute until 5th April 2023 £147.20
    £147.20 is the most you can get

I am retired from paid work.

My National Insurance record shows:
- 38 years of full contributions
- 1 year to contribute before 5 April 2023
- 11 years when you did not contribute enough

Summary of national insurance history:

Full year, for all years from 1975/6 to 2008/9 except for 1976/7 and 1977/8
Not full 2009/10, 2010/11, 2011/12
Full year, 2012/3 through to 2015/6
Not full thereafter.

I spoke to DWP.  They gave me a payment code, and told me the gaps that I am able to fill, as follows:
2009/10 £824.20
2010/11 £824.20
2011/12 £126.80

2016/17 £824.20
2017/18 £824.20
2018/19 £824.20
2019/20 £824.20
2020/21 £795.60
2021/22 £800.80

They made it clear that some of these gap payments would not affect my pension, but they were unable to advise which ones.

Thanks in advance, anyone who is able to help

Strange that DWP could not tell you which years would add to your pension, are you sure that was not HMRC as they are the ones that give you a payment code ?

Are you getting those payment figures from your on line tax account as the pension amounts you have quoted do not make sense unless you have been self employed and not been paying class 2 and those gap years are showing as "checking" - is that the case ?

With 38 pre 2016 years only years from 2016-17 and onwards will add to your pension.  You need 9 years to reach the maximum but you cannot do that  as there are only 7 available to you which will take you to £178.94.

Wow, that was quick.  Thank you - really appreciated.

I queued for a long time, using one of the numbers on the page which showed my pension forecast.  The lady told me that I needed to speak to the Future Pensions Centre for the information, and when I asked "Who are you with?" she said DWP.  Perhaps the Future Pensions Centre are a specialist unit of DWP?

Yes, I was self employed and not paying class 2 - I was fairly ignorant of the system.  The forecast does not show "checking", just "not full".

Based on what you say, I will pay the years from 2016/7 onwards.

You guys are doing a great job, helping to fill the gap left by the government here.  I am quite lucky, in that getting these payments wrong would not be life-changing, but many who need every penny, and who are not fortunate enough to stumble on these forums will end up losing or wasting money.  I think this is likely to become a big public scandal soon.

If you click on the year it should give you a description of why the year is not full such as "you did not make any contributions" Your forecast pension amounts show that you have only 1 year available to pay (2022-23)  taking you from £141.91 to your personal maximum of £147.20 but we know that is not the case.  If a year is checking it does not exist to the pension forecasting computer so it does not include it.   It may be worth speaking to HMRC to see if you can pay class 2 for those years as that is only around £160 per year.

Rimlog

Rimlog said:

I would be very grateful if some of the experts here can please look my numbers and advise which National Insurance gaps it makes sense for me to fill.  I also have found the Future Pensions Centre impossible to contact.

I will be 66 on June 6th 2023.

My pension forecast says:
    Estimate based on your NI Record to 5th April 2022 £141.91
    Forecast if you contribute until 5th April 2023 £147.20
    £147.20 is the most you can get

I am retired from paid work.

My National Insurance record shows:
- 38 years of full contributions
- 1 year to contribute before 5 April 2023
- 11 years when you did not contribute enough

Summary of national insurance history:

Full year, for all years from 1975/6 to 2008/9 except for 1976/7 and 1977/8
Not full 2009/10, 2010/11, 2011/12
Full year, 2012/3 through to 2015/6
Not full thereafter.

I spoke to DWP.  They gave me a payment code, and told me the gaps that I am able to fill, as follows:
2009/10 £824.20
2010/11 £824.20
2011/12 £126.80

2016/17 £824.20
2017/18 £824.20
2018/19 £824.20
2019/20 £824.20
2020/21 £795.60
2021/22 £800.80

They made it clear that some of these gap payments would not affect my pension, but they were unable to advise which ones.

Thanks in advance, anyone who is able to help

Thanks again Molerat.  I clicked on the "Year is not full" years, and as you suspected, many of them are showing as "checking" - the years from 2016/7 onwards, and 2011/2.  Earlier ones are showing "no contributions made".

When I visited the forecast page again today, I was surprised to see that the forecast has changed, as follows:

    Estimate based on your NI Record to 5th April 2022 £156.24
    Forecast if you contribute until 5th April 2023 £162.06
    £162.06 is the most you can get

Does this affect your recommendations?

I don't understand why you say that paying Class 2 for some of the "checking" years might only cost £160, rather than the £800 or so that I was told on my previous call.  Why might those years be cheaper to fill?

Another question please - if I pay money using the code they gave me, can I assume that they will use it in the most efficient way for me, or do I need to somehow tell them which years to apply it to?

I spent another hour today trying to reach the Future Pensions Centre, with the same frustrations as before - I would not mind queueing, but they don't even give you that option, just keep hanging up on you.  Your help is greatly appreciated.

molerat

£156.24 is purely the 2023 10.1% uplift on the original £141.91 with the single gap year to top up now worth £5.82 instead of £5.29.  The situation has not changed.

£160 is the class 2 self employed rate so you need to check if you can pay that rate for those years that you were self employed but not paying.

If you pay using the code given they will allocate according to the conversation you had when getting the code.