I’m not sure any of that makes sense. There’s no relationship between a pension forecast and Pension Credit.
Pension credit could be reduced or removed by government legislation at any time, as for the state pension I have enough years of contributions / credits to qualify for a full state pension. Unless they change them again, born in 67, can claim my state pension from 67
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The process is well underway. The Savings element of Pension Credit is no longer available and the move to force so-called mixed age couples to claim UC rather than PC is both fiendishly complex and disheartening. State pension increases were also, in part, explicitly intended to reduce reliance on PC.
Wot he said.
Go online, get your Gateway password etc. sorted out if not already, get a forecast. If there are gaps a figure can be provided as the cost to fill them. And that’s it really.
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Agree but the pension service is separate from HMRC, I have spoken with them on several occasions and found the staff friendly and knowledgeable… yes really! Advice call them before you do anything and not afterwards.
It’s worth getting a Gateway account set up, as it makes dealing with HMRC etc a little easier.
I set mine up a few years ago now. It confirms my state pension entitlement, and lists my NI record going back to 1975-1976, iirc. I have been in two company pension schemes, and these, coupled with a couple of gaps in my NI record meant that I needed considerably more years’ contributions to maximise my state pension.
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As per my post above, when you call the Pension Service you are calling an outsourced call centre staffed by people with scripts and zero technical knowledge. You are both talking to anybody within the Pension Service at all. And again, they are not an advice set I’ve. They have no advice giving function and no duty of care.
The PS is currently under considerable outside scrutiny as it’s become obvious they have lied in Parliament about the extent of delays on even the most straightforward of claims and are in disarray to an extent that they’re about to find themselves on the wrong end of likely several judicial reviews. An excellent thread on the extent to which they are a basket case organisation can be found on the Rightsnet site. You’ll see several contributions from myself but it runs to 4 pages, which kind of speaks for itself.
Can’t agree with this Mike, yes they can be a bunch of numpties but advice not to contact them over something as important as pensions is imho not right.
Agree wholeheartedly, which is Exactly why people need to contact the pensions service to establish whether some or any contributions will add to their pension or not. Others such as citizens advice don’t have access to a persons records, and they too work in many cases from a script’
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Let me add some context then. I’m a senior manager within a local authority welfare rights service and I’m in my 37th year in the sector. I have managed many teams of staff and that includes one dedicated to nothing but the take-up of benefits for older people. I’m currently involved in a GMCA Pension Credit take-up campaign and I sit on a number of national forums. I also do some low key voluntary work for two national charities which is also helpful in terms of keeping my finger on the pulse outside of my own caseload and that of my staff.
It’s absolutely one of the great myths you go to the DWP for advice on DWP benefits. As already stated they are not an advice service or agency and they have no trained technical advisers outside of decision makers. They administer claims and pay benefits. They have literally zero advice function.
You won’t usually get to speak to decision makers on the phone as were that to become the norm then fewer decisions would get made. As we’re routinely reporting 6 months as a regular length of time to process a straightforward claim (single person on SRP, no other income or capital) I’d be confident you won’t have spoken to a decision maker. Easy enough to find the information online. Most likely you will have spoken to an employee of Serco, Accenture etc. Go back a decade and telephony did include some PS staff albeit that overflows were dealt with by the private sector. My view remains that if you want accurate pensions advice they are absolutely the last place on earth you should go. In my field you will struggle to find anyone other than inexperienced advisers who take a different view.
If you want a forecast then that’s an online process. If you want advice. Absolutely not the place to go.
I should add that I literally and quite viscerally wince when confronted by anyone who has used said phone lines. Over the decades I can count on one hand the occasions when full and accurate information was provided.
Nice to have some “context “ Mike. My personal experience with the the Newcastle based pension service has been positive on each occasionI have contacted and spoken with local and knowledgeable people. Indeed If you contact HMRC to buy an extra years NI contribution one of the questions they ask before accepting payment is “have you spoken to the pensions service to confirm your buying a year will actually uplift your pension?”
I hear what you’re saying and understand your stated experience but as this is a matter regarding money I’d personally do what everyone however knowledgeable in finance states re investment etc, “ do your own research”. This should include contacting the relevant govt department and checking with them. Personally I record my conversations with such bodies … purely for my own training and monitoring reasons of course……
If issue’s arise later I can fall back on info given at the time.
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Great advice, I did this a couple of weeks ago. It’s a bit of a faff to set up the Gov Gateway ( I guess it needs to be, in view of security concerns etc…) but if you have a smart phone it only took a 10 minutes or so if you follow the instructions carefully…
Having got access to the Gateway, all the NI information is visible - it then makes any subsequent calls to the NI office so much better informed.
Good luck all…
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Good luck. Newcastle part outsourced. The only semi-competent part of it all at present but there have been multiple “incidents”.
Sadly your recordings will be nothing more than an interesting record. The lack of an advice function means the principle of estoppel has been repeatedly brought to bear i.e. even if you have recorded evidence of poor advice upon which you felt compelled to act DWP cannot be bound by it. Decades of binding case law on that.
Just found this on google. Some good advice.
It does mention that the opportunity to claim for more than six years ends April 2023.
My circumstances mean the decision is very easy to make.
I’ve paid more than 35 years NI, so don’t need to claim.
My wife’s not paid NI for 34 years, but due to the fact she got a years credit for every year she received child benefit, she only need to pay 4 years NI to get full pension. 
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Fatcat, great advice too.
For the benefit of others, if you intend to claim for years 2006 onwards, there is a looming deadline of 5 April 2023 to get your application in. I am currently doing this….
Best, Paul
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There is another way to boost my wife’s pension.
Basically. If you look after the child of a relative and that relative pays NI, you can claim NI credits. (But, I don’t know how much).
It’s a win win situation.
Free NI contributions and child labour to help with the housework.
He’s missed a bit.
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What’s the position for years when you were in full time higher education?
When I was at University, I worked for 3-4 summers for the local council, and received letters from DWP I think saying I had not paid enough NI in those 4-5 weeks each year to qualify for a year’s contributions - there was a short window when I could have topped up with additional payments, but with mounting student debts over 6 years this was not a priority and then the opportunity passed.
Has SERPS closed? When I started work and signed up for the occupational pension I was ‘advised’ to opt out of SERPS - it may have been mandatory, but more likely it was just implied you were wasting your time with SERPS as the occupational scheme was better. I now wonder if SERPS would have required an employer contribution as well and the advice to opt out was therefore to save the employer some money!
Nice link.
As for the child benefit, I think the child benefit tax charge is one of the most unfair taxation policies whereby the higher earner (above a threshold) has to repay the child benefit paid to the lower earner or homemaker. You could have a couple where one partner earned nothing, and the other was a pound over the threshold so the benefit would have to be repaid. In stark contrast a couple both earning just under the threshold could have virtually double the household income and not have to repay the child benefit they’d claimed.
When Mrs AC was on maternity leave I happened to hear the advice on one of the Radio 4 money shows that it was wise to claim child benefit regardless, even if the other partner had to pay it back, as it generated the appropriate NI credits as though the claimant had been in work and paid them.
As you only need 35 years NI contributions, those 3 or 4 years are probably irrelevant.
I was also advised to opt out of serps in the late 80s. However, I was the only person in the company that didn’t opt out. The pension advisor said ‘well it’s your money you’re wasting’.
12 months ago I gota pension forecast which indicated I’d get £45 per week serps pension.
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It was 6 years in total, so I might need to work until 60 or just beyond to get the full 35 years. Must re-check the government gateway site as in theory I should be ok at 59 assuming a few years when I took a few months unpaid still count as I’m sure I’d have paid enough in during teh part years.
Edit: Just checked and I have 6 ‘gap years’ but already have 34 qualifying years - somehow I got 3 between ages 16-18 I suspect as I stayed on at school until 18. It’s also a bit odd that although I did not contribute to SERPS if I do work on after 60 in some capacity I suspect I could amass over 40 qualifying years but would have no enhancement to state pension as far as I can tell. I’d not be surprised if they change it all again before my state retirement age anyway!
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