Do you qualify for a state pension increase?

Did you know that some 194,000 people have been underpaid their state pension? The errors, which mostly affect women, have a combined worth of between £520 million and £1,220 million. In this post, we explain how the errors were made. We also explain how you can apply for a refund and a state pension increase.

State pension entitlement

In a nutshell, your National Insurance (NI) payments over the years build up your state pension entitlement. The number of ‘qualifying years’ you need for a full pension depends on your age and gender. Citizens Advice publishes a good summary of the rules here. If you don’t have the required number of qualifying years, your pension will be lower than the maximum.

These days, if you don’t pay National Insurance, you can get National Insurance Credits in certain circumstances. These contribute towards ‘qualifying years’. For example, you can claim these credits if you’re unemployed, on statutory sick pay or you are a parent who claims Child Benefit for a child under 12. The latter is to allow parents to stay at home while their children are young, but without damaging their National Insurance contributions record.

Why you might qualify for a state pension increase

Between 6th April 1978 and 5th April 2010, there was a different system to protect the NI record of stay-at-home parents. This was called Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP). It could be claimed by parents or guardians who got Child Benefit for a child under 16.

So far, so good. Unfortunately there was a glitch in the HRP system. Before May 2000, it wasn’t compulsory to disclose your National Insurance number on the Child Benefit claim form. If you didn’t provide your NI number, you may not have had HRP applied to your National Insurance Record. In some instances this will mean you’re getting a smaller state pension than you’re entitled to.

The problem is also compounded by another issue. The Department for Work and Pensions only keeps Child Benefit data for five years. This means it can’t automatically work out who has been underpaid their pension. For this reason, you will have to make a claim if HRP has not been applied to your NI account.

How to check whether you’re owed a state pension increase

Fortunately, it’s quite straightforward to check whether you’re owed a state pension increase and claim any arrears.

Firstly, you need to check you were eligible for Home Responsibilities Protection. You can do this here.

Next you should check your NI payment record to verify than HRP wasn’t applied to your account. You can do this here.

Finally, you can make your claim for a state pension increase. This takes about 15 minutes to do online.

However, please note that if you first claimed Child Benefit after May 2000, HRP will have been automatically applied to your NI account. This is because, from that date, it was compulsory to provide your NI number in your application.

Need help?

If you are a THP client, we can help you check whether there are any gaps in your NI record. Just get in touch with one of our accountants. If you need any support in making a claim for backdated HRP, you can also call the National Insurance Helpline on 0300 200 3500.