So, many of us will soon be getting £203.85 a week New State Pension whilst older people’s will increase to £156.20.
There is a lot of discussion about whether this is fair and I think it is! I have friends who were just a couple of months older than me but they got their SPs when they were 62. I had to wait another 4 YEARS! At the time none of them had sympathy for me and said there had to be a cut off date and I was just unlucky! Now they hear that us very slightly younger people will get about £47 a week more than them they are outraged.
I don’t really know much about it but don’t a lot of older people who don’t get the New State Pension get Additional Pension that makes up the difference?
Im on the old Pension rate , if it wasn’t for the Private Pension my hubby left me Id not be able to manage , and would probably get a shed load of Benefits, as it is I pay Tax on my 2 Pensions .
I don’t mind that cause It leaves me in a position of Independence , without having to declare everything to the SS, Im not beholden to the State .
As my retirement income is complicated, I have to submit annual return forms and I even have to add in my state pension as taxable income. HMRC receive a shed load of money from me every year from my retirement income.
You can’t compare just the amount of the basic state pension with the full new state pension because the New State Pension is all you get, whereas pensioners who receive the old basic state pension will receive an extra amount called Additional State Pension (unless they had contracted out of SERPS and diverted it to a private pension plan.)
Also, not everyone who is retiring on a New State Pension is getting the full amount of it - there is some complicated calculations during the transitioning from the old state pension cut off date to the new system and it can result in you getting less, especially if you’ve contracted out of SERPS or decided to retire earlier than your State Pension Date.
Even if you have paid more than the total 35 years of National Insurance, if there are gaps in NI contributions in any of the years after 2016, it will reduce the amount of pension payable.
During this transition period, people are offered the chance to pay a lump sum to fill any gaps in the NI record from 2016 onwards to enable them to receive the full amount of the new state pension. If they can’t afford it or choose not to top it up, they will receive a lower amount.
So it’s not as straightforward as just comparing the old basic state pension figure with the maximum new state pension figure.
If someone newly retired doesn’t have any private pension to claim and receives less then the minimum state pension surely they will receive pension credit to bring them up to the correct single person allowance
Yes, means-tested benefits are available to those who are eligible but that depends on what other income and savings you have, so that’s a different kettle of fish to just comparing the old basic state pension plus additional pension to the new state pension, as none of those are means-tested.
The best a person can hope for is at retirement age, to be physically able to supplement a pension (of any designation) with a bit of work income, the physical ability being more important than the income. If your lucky, retirement should mean reducing the 40 hour week to say 15 or so.
I often read about younger people moaning about having to work to pay for old age pensioners getting their money. Its not their money it is ours worked and paid for in national insurance over many years. If we were allowed instead to put the national insurance “pension part” into a private pension we would all be far better off.
My revised pension arrives this month and the increase should be in the region of £16 per week, which will buy more than the cup of coffee that previous increases bought …
I hope you mean the increase will be £16 a week and not the pension!
I haven’t worked out what I’ll get in State Pension increase yet and I’ve forgotten what the % increase was going to be - as I only started drawing it in the middle of last year, I haven’t got used to having this extra money yet - which is just as well because the tax office didn’t get round to taxing me on my State Pension income for the first 8 months, so they are now taxing me extra for the last 4 months of the tax year to claw it back - so I don’t see much extra income from my State Pension at present.
Maybe after April, I’ll get an idea of how much better off I’ll be - it might go towards saving for next Winter’s leccy bills!
Wasn’t there a proverb about robbing Peter to pay Paul?
As the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has confirmed, benefits such as additional pensions will be increased by 10.1 per cent from April 2023, in line with the increase in the Consumer Prices Index in the 12 months from September 2021 to September 2022.
Thanks for that info @Omah - that works out at just under £15 per week increase for me, after tax - it’s better than a kick in the teeth - but considering it is only keeping pace with inflation, we still have eat and heat on that!
