for more information, kindly provided by The Institute of Cancer Research - click here
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for more information, kindly provided by The Institute of Cancer Research - click here |
by Chris Bishop
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Information provided by our resident Independent Financial Advisor (IFA), Christopher Bishop, of Coastal Insurance & Mortgage Services, Sussex. (To contact,
e-mail info@coastalinsurance.co.uk)
or telephone: +44 (0)1273 587274
)
When you retire your
pension / income may be made up of a combination of the following: Women born after April 1950
will be affected by this decision by the Government to equalise the pension
age to age 65. You can still draw the State Pension and continue working (no further personal NI contributions need be paid!) Click here to go back to the top of the page. Basic State Pension: depends on your NI contributions, and what you receive depends on how many 'qualifying years' you have during your working life. This pension has to be claimed; you will be sent form BR1 before reaching State Pension Age (contact Pensions Service if not received within approx. 4 months of retirement age on 0845 300 0168) - complete immediately and return. Qualifying years are based on the NI contributions you have paid, (either yourself if you are self-employed or via your employer), been treated as having paid or been credited with. If you do not have enough, you may be able to pay some extra contributions. Check this by referring to www.pensionguide.gov.uk Each year that you have paid National Insurance contributions will count towards your 'qualifying years'. Years when a woman chose to pay the married woman's reduced rate of NI do not count towards qualifying years. You can defer pension until age 70 (men) and age 65 (women), and the pension paid will then be higher - unfortunately you will not be paid for the weeks you give up by taking the pension later. To qualify for extra State Pension by deferring, you must defer for at least 5 weeks. You will qualify for either State Pension or a one-off taxable lump-sum payment when you do claim, whether you carry on working or not - your options will depend on how long you delayed taking the pension. To qualify for the lump sum payment you must defer for 12 consecutive months in order to receive this Once you start receiving your Basic State Pension, it is usually increased each April if you live in the UK for tax purposes. See below for information re obtaining a forecast of your anticipated Basic State Pension. Working life
Your working life is counted from the start of the tax year in which you reach the age of 16 to the end of the tax year before the one in which you reach State Pension age. The following will give a rough guide re the amount you could receive from the Basic State Pension - please only use these amounts as a guide. The rules for benefits mean that your individual circumstances may affect the amount you can get. This means you will not always be able to work out exactly how much you will get by using these amounts. Basic State Pension (per week from 12 April 2006)
All benefits are reviewed each year with most benefits being updated in April. Click here to go back to the top of the page. This is based on your graduated NI Contributions paid between April 1961 and April 1975. For every £7.50 (man) or £9 (woman) of graduated contributions paid you will receive 10.20p (in 2006/07). From 1978 to 2002 additional State Pension was paid from the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme (SERPS) and was only available to employees. It depends solely on the NI contributions you paid as an employee. From 6 April 2002, SERPS was reformed to provide a more generous additional State Pension for low and moderate earners, and to extend access to include certain carers and people with long-term illness or disability. This is called the State Second Pension and you may receive this even if you do not get any basic State Pension. Click here to go back to the top of the page. Before 5.4.03. extra State Pension was paid for any children you had responsibility for, or if somebody else looked after those children for you. If you received the increase before 5.4.03. it will continue to be paid - after 6.4.03. provision for children is made via Child Tax Credits. The amount you could receive is:
Dependent adults You may receive £50.50 p.wk (in 2006/07) for a spouse or a person looking after children paid with your State Pension (based on your NI contributions). If you are a married woman and you have not got enough NI contributions to earn a Basic State Pension of your own, your husband's contributions can be used to work out your pension (as long as he has reached State Pension age and claimed his pension). This could give a woman a pension of up to 60% of the full Basic State Pension, and she does not have to be living with her husband in order to receive the pension. At present a married man cannot receive a pension based on his wife's NI contributions record - this will change from 2010. There are other circumstances where it may be possible to claim some Basic State Pension even if you have paid insufficient National Insurance contributions, e.g. if you have been unemployed or disabled or caring for children or on a very low wage / income. The Pension Service will be able to advise - or contact your local Citizens Advice Bureau for advice. Click here to go back to the top of the page. After age 80 you will get an extra .25p on top of the State Pension If you are over 80 and don't have a Basic State Pension, there is a non-contributory pension for people aged over 80. This is presently set at 60% of the Basic State Pension, and you need to be: * living in Great Britain at the time you claim * and must have lived in GB for a total of 10 years or more in any continuous period of 20 years after your 60th birthday * have no Basic State Pension OR * have less than 60% of the full rate. Click here to go back to the top of the page. WIDOWED? You may be able to get a Basic State Pension from your late spouse / civil partner, and you should contact the Pensions Service for details Click here to go back to the top of the page. SERPS (State Earnings-related pension scheme) & SSP (State Second Pension) This was and is not applicable to self-employed, and is a method of building up an additional State Pension if you were employed. SERPs was based on your record of NI contributions and your level of earning as an employee. SERPS is based on earnings since 1978 - 2002; you do not have to be receiving Basic Pension to be entitled to SERPS On 6th April 2002, the State Second Pension reformed SERPs, the idea being to provide a more generous additional State Pension for low and moderate earners, some carers and people with disabilities, and people who may have had their working life shortened or interrupted. Any SERPs entitlement that has already been built up is protected, both for those who have already retired and those who have not yet reached State Pension Age. Widowed and your spouse was receiving SERPS? Changes have been introduced which reduce the maximum amount of SERPs that a widow or widower may inherit from their spouse. This will depend on their circumstances - please contact the Pensions Service for details if this is applicable Widowed and your spouse was receiving SSP? The maximum amount that a surviving spouse can inherit will be 50% Click here to go back to the top of the page. After April 6th 2006: If you are still contributing to a scheme, please check the funding to ensure you do not exceed the lifetime allowance limits If you are over age 60 and your total pension funds from all sources total £15,000 or under, you may be eligible to take the whole fund without the need to purchase an annuity. Some of the fund will be taxable, so please check this with your provider. Earliest age at which benefits can now be taken is age 50, but this will rise to 55 by 6.4.2010 (take advice if you belong to a special occupation with lower retirement age or if retiring due to ill health) You will no longer have to wait until age 60 to take benefits from protected rights contracts - furthermore you may access 25% of the fund as tax-free cash (this can sometimes depend on the individual occupation scheme). This latter point may also apply to AVC's and FSAVC's - check with the scheme rules or insurance company If your scheme rules allow - it may be possible to take the benefits but still continue to accrue benefits whilst in the same scheme, before or beyond normal pension age Pension benefits must still be taken by age 75, but with greater flexibility than previously At age 75, instead of purchasing an annuity, individuals may now purchase an 'alternatively secured pension' (asp), from which dependents have to take an income using the fund after the death of the policyholder Check your rights to tax-free cash from your pension - this may have altered. Click
here to go back to the top of the page. Click
here to go back to the top of the page. Click here to go back to the top of the page.
Improve the position before
you retire Click here to go back to the top of the page.
'Shop
around' for a better pension when you retire Click
here to go back to the top of the page. Click here to go back to the top of the page. Pension Credit is an entitlement for people aged 60 or over living in the United Kingdom and could mean extra money for you every week. The aim is to ensure that everybody over 60 has a minimum income - the amount you are entitled to at least alters so please refer to www.pensionguide.gov.uk for up-to-date information. It is possible that once you apply, you may be able to get up to 12 months back-payments if you could have been entitled earlier. The person who applies for Pension Credit must be at least 60; it does not matter if your partner (i.e. the person you are married to or a civil partner or the person you live with as if you are civil partners) is not yet 60. If over 65 you may still be entitled to Pension Credit if your weekly income is more than the minimum amount prescribed if you or your partner is severely disabled, looks after a person who is severely disabled, or have certain housing costs, e.g. mortgage interest payments. Click here to go back to the top of the page. Since 1st December 2000, couples who have a marriage ending in divorce or annulment can share in the value of their pension rights. This is NOT compulsory, and only applies where divorce proceedings were started after 1st December 2000. Pension sharing does not apply to the Basic State Pension (divorced people can already replace their own contributions record with their husband or wife record for the period that the marriage lasted), or couples who separate but do not divorce. Please be aware that this is a general over view and a) the rulings may differ in Northern Ireland and Scotland, and b) legal and personal financial advice should definitely be sought. Click here to go back to the top of the page. If entitled to a pension from an occupational scheme, you will be entitled to continue to receive your pension, and any increases as per the scheme rules and current legislation. Increases will depend on the country where you are then living. Normally the pension will be taxable in the UK. It may also be liable to tax in the country in which you live. If so, you may be able to get relief under the terms of any double taxation treaty between the UK and the country in which you live. You will still receive your Basic State Pension (including any entitlement to SERPS / SSP) but you will not get an increase in these pensions unless you live in the EEC or a country that has an agreement with the UK allowing for such an increase (known as an 'uprating'). See below for contacts Click here to go back to the top of the page. Be aware That your present pension scheme may provide life assurance (in occupational schemes this is known as death-in-service) and this will cease when you start taking your pension. It may be possible to replace this - speak to an IFA to ensure that advice given is sound. Please remember if replacing life assurance not to cancel the existing protection until acceptance received re the new protection. Click here to go back to the top of the page. Be aware
That if you die after taking your pension, your spouse's pension may reduce.
Try and plan for this Click here to go back to the top of the page. DON'T FORGET: TO CHECK YOUR ENTITLEMENT TO PENSIONS OF ALL TYPES, E.G. STATE PENSION, PENSION CREDIT, PENSIONS FROM EX-EMPLOYERS, ETC AND ONCE OVER AGE 75, DON'T FORGET YOUR FREE TV LICENCE! AND once you are 70 or over, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency will not charge you a fee for a three-year driving licence! For Driving Licence info please contact 0870 240 0009. AND If you were 16 years old or older at the end of World War II (that is you were born on or before 2 September 1929), you are eligible for free standard 32-page 10-year passports. Click here to go back to the top of the page. The content and information normally provided on this page is currently being updated - please do return!
Useful contacts: State Pension claimline
phone: 0845 300 1084 Living abroad? phone: +44 (0) 191 218 7777 or fax: +44 (0) 191 218 7293 contact The Pension Service International Pension Centre
Financial Services Authority phone: 020 7066 1000 Independent body; regulates financial services industry in UK
or write to: Pension Tracing Service, The Pension Service, Tyneview Park, Whitley Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE98 1BA you will need your name, d.o.b., National Insurance number, and full details of your missing / lost pension
Pension Advisory Service (TPAS)
phone: 0845 601 2923 Pension Ombudsman phone: 020 7834 9144 The Pension Service phone: 0845 60 60 265 Driving Licence phone: 0870 240 0009 Passports phone: 0870 521 0410Click here to go back to the top of the page. this feature and contents updated May 2006 |
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