Confused about forecast

Dazed_and_C0nfused

I think you are conflating eligibility to purchase qualifying years and whether purchasing said years will impact your State Pension entitlement.

You are perfectly within your rights to purchase any year(s) available where you are within the time limit to do so.  They just aren't all guaranteed to improve your State Pension.

There is more detailed gov.uk guidance here,

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/your-new-state-pension-explained/your-state-pension-explained

LITRG have a guide here.  In particular a useful Before making any payment of voluntary contributions you should section

https://www.litrg.org.uk/pensions/state-pension/national-insurance-and-state-pension#4

jem16

mxh said:

molerat said:

As you made the decision without taking advice and paid using a "back door" method from the internet the only approach is the grovelling "I have made a silly mistake".  They have been fairly flexible on this in recent times and it is for them a fairly straight forward task.

Hang on, that's a bit harsh.

The advice was basically from Martin on this site - I looked into it and did the calculations and it made sense. Can you point me to anywhere that I should have been aware of that warns me of this 'pre-2016' issue.

And it wasn't a 'back-door' method at all - I applied to pay Class 2 contributions and this was accepted. Looking back into it, I can see I was sent an 18 digit reference number by HMRC and used that in conjunction with my NI number to make the payments following the instructions on the HMRC website - https://www.gov.uk/pay-class-2-national-insurance. What exactly is 'back door' about that?

jem16 said:

Are you living abroad by any chance? If so did you complete form CF83 to see if you were eligible for the cheaper Class 2 contributions?

Yes, I'm living abroad, and yes I completed the CF83. They replied and confirmed I was eligible and gave me an 18 digit reference to use in the payments.

This section on Martin Lewis’ article gives the warning. Did you call the DWP helpline as it says?

“Important: If you were 'contracted out' of the additional State Pension before 2016, topping up may not help.

Much here depends on your NI record from that period and it's difficult to generalise. So it's doubly important to call the Department for Work and Pensions' helplines in step 6 to understand if paying to plug any NI record gaps will actually result in you being paid more State Pension.

You're more likely to have been contracted out if you worked in the public sector. You can check by looking at a pre-2016 payslip or P60 – if the NI contributions line has D, E, L, N or O next to it, you were contracted out.”

Paying NI from abroad doesn’t use the 18 digit reference as that’s for people in the UK. It uses a combination of your NI number, IC and your name. 

molerat

mxh said:

Hang on, that's a bit harsh.
......................................

And it wasn't a 'back-door' method at all - I applied to pay Class 2 contributions and this was accepted. ..............................

jem16 said:

Are you living abroad by any chance? If so did you complete form CF83 to see if you were eligible for the cheaper Class 2 contributions?

Yes, I'm living abroad, and yes I completed the CF83. They replied and confirmed I was eligible and gave me an 18 digit reference to use in the payments.

Well, that makes all the difference to whether the method is back door or not as it was a method being promoted in some places for UK residents to overcome the getting an 18 digit reference problem.

Suhusa

jem16 said:

Paying NI from abroad doesn’t use the 18 digit reference as that’s for people in the UK. It uses a combination of your NI number, IC and your name.

Actually I always get an 18 digit reference for my half-yearly Class 2 payments. (Although curiously the bill I get is for Class 3 and I get a rebate so that the amount of NIC I've got to pay is equivalent to Class 2 - and I did definitely apply with form CF83).

jem16

Suhusa said:

jem16 said:

Paying NI from abroad doesn’t use the 18 digit reference as that’s for people in the UK. It uses a combination of your NI number, IC and your name.

Actually I always get an 18 digit reference for my half-yearly Class 2 payments. (Although curiously the bill I get is for Class 3 and I get a rebate so that the amount of NIC I've got to pay is equivalent to Class 2 - and I did definitely apply with form CF83).

Rather odd way to do it. My son pays Class 2 from abroad yearly. He has to use the NI Number, IC and name as the reference. It’s always just the Class 2 amount. He is using a UK bank account though so perhaps that makes a difference.

Suhusa

I can only assume that there was a slight mess-up when my payments were initially set up - I certainly was surprised to see something about a Class 3 payment on my first bill. But all payments are credited correctly so I'm not going to get into a fight over that. (And I pay by Wise using a UK account number as it's by far the cheapest option for me).

jem16

Suhusa said:

I can only assume that there was a slight mess-up when my payments were initially set up - I certainly was surprised to see something about a Class 3 payment on my first bill. But all payments are credited correctly so I'm not going to get into a fight over that. (And I pay by Wise using a UK account number as it's by far the cheapest option for me).

Are you using the Direct Debit option?

Suhusa

Nope, I pay by bank transfer.