There has been a “shocking” reduction in the number of state pension arrears the government expects to pay out to mothers who were underpaid.
Until now, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had assumed it would reach about 9 in 10 of mothers who missed out on payments due to errors on their national insurance (NI) records – and had set aside over £1bn for arrears payment.
But a DWP report for 2024-25, published on Thursday, shows that it expects the take up rate of reclaiming the payments to drop from 90 per cent to 8 per cent, following a failed mass letter-writing campaign.
It also expects the amount it pays out in arrears to be as little as £104m.
The issue has arisen because many thousands of mothers are missing “Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP)” on their NI record – a form of protection for the NI record of mothers (and some fathers) who received child benefit for a child under 16 since 1978.
Such years should have generated a form of NI credit which would have helped to boost the state pension of many such women.
However, when the DWP undertook full sample checks of state pensions following a previous set of large-scale errors, it discovered many cases where mothers did not have HRP on their record.
This largely arose from claims made before 2000 where it was not required to put an NI number on the child benefit claim form and therefore such claims were not linked to the NI record correctly.
To track down such women, the government undertook a publicity campaign which included letters from HMRC to 370,000 people, of which 257,000 are already over pension age.
However, the letters told people to use an online checker to see if they were entitled and to use an online claim form to apply. The response to these letters was poor, with recipients put off by the online claim process, thinking the letters might be scams, or not understanding the issue.
square ISAS 'Relief' for savers as plan to cut cash ISA allowance is delayed by Reeves
Read More
The result of this is that the government has so far corrected the records of just 12,379 pensioners, paying out £104m – well short of the original estimate of well over £1bn that was due to such women.
The department now expects to spend just £29.8m more on future corrections and has removed £1bn set aside for such payments in its accounts.
The report reveals that the reason for this is that the take-up of corrected HRP, which was previously estimated to be 90 per cent in 2024-25 is now just 8 per cent. This means the DWP expects that more than 9 in 10 of those who are thought to be eligible will not get what they are entitled to.
Sir Steve Webb, partner at consultancy LCP and former pensions minister, first raised this issue with DWP more than fifteen years ago and an initial correction exercise was undertaken at the time. But since then the problem has grown considerably and, as things stand, is likely to remain unresolved.
He said: “DWP’s latest report is a hammer blow to over 100,000 mothers who are receiving reduced state pensions because of errors on their NI record.
“The government’s letter-writing campaign has been a dismal failure and this was entirely predictable given its reliance on a complicated online claims process.
“Although there will still be some ongoing publicity, the figures in the annual report are an admission that the government itself does not expect these efforts to have much impact. In effect, the government has all but given up on these mothers and this is totally unacceptable.
“It is time for a fresh campaign of direct mail to the women potentially affected, this time making it much easier for women to apply and supported by a fresh publicity blitz”.
The DWP says that their strategy now will rely on revising material on gov.uk, looking at messaging in annual uprating letters, undertaking “regular communications activity through the year”, and “strengthening ongoing relationships with external stakeholder groups”.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Thousands of mothers to miss out on millions in state pension payments in ‘hammer blow’ )
Also on site :
- Heartbreaking letters Camp Mystic children wrote to their family arrive days after they died in Texas floods
- Watch- Shubman Gill reacts as Ravindra Jadeja teases him in front of Sara Tendulkar
- ‘I knew I would prevail’: Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil talks to CNN about his months in ICE detention