New State Pension Guide

p00hsticks wrote: »

Does it say how many full NI years you have ?

Yes. Though it is a different link on your 'Personal Account' page to the State Pensions forecast page.

p00hsticks wrote: »

And does it give a cOPE figure ?

Again yes There's a link on the forecast page that takes you to a new page for COPE. On mine it says: Your COPE estimate is £31.02 a week.

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So don't be too proud to sign on. Good luck fj
Originally posted by bigfreddiel ”
Thanks, Freddie. But pride has nothing to do with it. I would just rather pay my own 'stamp' than have anything to do with the kind of idiot you have to deal with at the Job Centre - can't help you to find work. but quick to suggest you're 'not doing enough to find work yourself. That's just me though. In general it is good advice for people to sign on and get their stamp paid for them..

John - you're so right. Mr S and I retired from the Armed Forces back when we needed 44 years (him) and 39 years (me) NI conts in order to qualify for the full basic State pension. The resettlement advice given was that if we didn't start civvie jobs the day after leaving the RAF we should 'sign on' to get our NI paid so we wouldn't lose a full year. We knew that our pensions ruled out JSA, but DWP didn't have a form for just NI. We had to complete the full JSA application form which was a faff and a half. One of the questions was ' what are your savings? If you have more than £8K, then you may not be entitled to JSA'. We both put '£8K plus'. The forms were shoved back to us with the demand for details of our actual savings 'for our records'. We refused, and reminded the clerk - again - that we were only claiming NI conts. They finally accepted the form, but some time later we got letters stating - wait for it - 'your application for JSA has been carefully considered but is not approved because according to Government guidelines you have too much money to live on !!
We did get our stamp paid, but had to 'sign on' every two weeks and show details of our job search activities. At the 3 month point, at which time I had been interviewed for a job but hadn't been informed that I had got it, we were called in for a 'special interview'. Silly me thought that the young minnie had actually read my file. Wrong - she just rabbited on about how I couldn't be too picky, and that if I didn't get a job in the next two weeks they would either insist that I took any job, or they would stop my 'benefits'. I' d had enough of this, so I told her that I would pay my own NI and asked her how I should go about paying it. She didn't have a clue.

bigfreddiel wrote: »

John and Silver, I agree signing on was a complete farce, when I was made redundant I was back at my place of work on a week by week casual contract, earning about £1k per week (1990 so not too bad pay!). But I was still allowed to sign on each week and just declare my earnings. Stamp paid, but no benefit. Casual work lasted about 10 weeks, I already had my £20k redundancy, £10k in earnings, but then I got my benefit, about £30 or was it £40/week then?

I too had to attend various 'events' like the executives club or some sort of contrived name. As long as I signed in, had my interview, cup of tea and biccie, stamp was paid, happy days. I wasn't doing anything else anyway so it was something to look forward to in a way.

After six months, summer was over so I decided I had better get a job, which I did all by myself.

Cheers fj

OH signed on after redundancy and continued after the 6 months payments (not means tested until 6th month point) to keep NI. Staff at the centre wished OH good luck and said they would miss their fortnightly chats when OH got a job. They told her that a number of attendees only signed on to keep their mortgage payment protection insurance valid.

Anyone know the backstop date for updating the SP amounts using Apr 2016 NI figures ?

A person who will reach SP age in march 2019 and now retired so no more NI payments. They have had a SP forecast of £141 so £14 off the £155 figure, can they only make around 2 and a half years voluntary contributions to gain more SP.

The SP will be drawn as soon as they are allowed too, and not defered.