State pension amount.

The Armed Forces were contracted out to pay for the service pension on retirement, so at age 66 I will only get the state pension what is currently £185/wk.
 
conny said:
You 'may' only qualify for these things if you have no other income. If you own your own house you will not get housing benefit because there are no payments to make. You will be entitled to free prescriptions by right of age, you 'may' get help with your council tax, (but have to apply for it). Whilst people 'may' be entitled to 'apply' for certain benefits, it does not go that they will automatically get them. Some benefits are decided on by what the household income is. For instance, a bloke retires, he's never saved into a company/private pension so is only entitled to the state pension. He rents his home and has to pay all utilities including council tax. On the face of it you would think he qualifies for help.
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I get absolutely no optional extra help and no discounts, as a home owner, with money in the bank - other than the very basics of bus pass, free prescriptions.

Income wise, I suspect I would have been better had I lived in rented property and not carefully saved my money.
 
Harry Bloomfield said:
Income wise, I suspect I would have been better had I lived in rented property and not carefully saved my money.
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You would have. Also, those of us wise enough to have saved money are now having its value eroded by all the reckless money printing.
 
Harry Bloomfield said:
Income wise, I suspect I would have been better had I lived in rented property and not carefully saved my money.
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Possibly true but you wouldn’t have had much of a say in the house you lived in - might be a one-bet flat in a block. Would you have preferred that just to have a bit of extra cash in your pocket!
 
Mottie said:
Possibly true but you wouldn’t have had much of a say in the house you lived in - might be a one-bet flat in a block. Would you have preferred that just to have a bit of extra cash in your pocket!
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Absolutely not, but it does make one wonder if it was worth all of the effort, and continuing effort to maintain, when I could have a life of easy leisure and someone else taking care of repairs along with the cost of.
 
Ihavenojob said:
When I looked into mine it was about £140 a week. That was because I was opted out for a few years and not paid enough. Forgot my password for the gateway so I haven't been able to see what I will get now.
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Managed to get back in and check my pension, £158 a week, but with the triple lock (if they keep it) it should be well over £250 a week.
 
Mottie said:
I was talking to my mate yesterday who was saying that because of the recent increase to the state pension, when he starts getting his, next year, he will be getting just over £200 a week because it is £185 at the moment. Looking on my forecast on the government gateway, I’m already supposed to be getting £218 a week when I get mine, also next year, so that means mine, after the triple lock rise will be going up to around £240 a week. I can’t work out why my pension is already forecast to be £33 above the maximum. I’ve looked it up and all I can find is something about serps but that was only if you were born before 1951, which I obviously wasn’t. Any experts on here that can tell me why my forecast is higher than the maximum?
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Just had a look on the Government Gateway and it will be £240.40 per week when I eventually start getting it.

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I've just been sent a link from my mate who's getting his first pension payment this month. He is getting £248.57 a week.

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Maybe it depends how old you are when you do the enqury and they're building in an assumed increment? Or it's just your SERPS payments showing.

Did you contract out of the Serps scheme?
Did you top up your basic State Pension (only possible between 12 October 2015 and 5 April 2017)?
The maximum amount you can get in 2023/24 is £204.68 a week (not including the State Pension top-up).
SERPS is paid directly into your bank account as an additional State Pension along with your basic State Pension. I believe the aggregate figure is what they tell you if you do an inquiry.

Many who "contracted out" paid into a private pension, instead, like I did.
I thought that would mean I'd get a reduced state pension, but HMG apparently were nice to us, so people who contracted out were all able to still get the max SP if they had enough Years-In. That number of years wasn't very high (35)?, so many WERE able to contribute enough to top them up, in their remaining years of earning, which is what I did.

Ihavenojob said:
my forecast at the moment is £174 a week, I can pay about £6.5k in voluntary contributions to make it up.
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You must be short of the number of years(35?) you need for full SP, then. One can only pay in to coer a max number of missing years, which iirc is 6. If you can reach the max, you're better off than some. I know someone who contracted out as early as possible under their employer's scheme, and now can't reach the full pension figure.

So the sum is simple. You can get an extra (204 - 174) = £30 per week by paying in £6.5k.

£6.5 / £30 = 217 weeks = 4yrs 9 weeks, so if you reckon you're going to keep alive until that long over your retirement age, pay the money in.

Inflation should be cancelled out by the government's triple lock pension pledge, if they decide to keep that on.

If they do, putting money into the state pension is giving you the best return you can get anywhere, at the moment. Where else can you get ~10%?

Live long and prosper - I don't now anticipate being alive more than a couple of years after pension age, so you lot benefit from my contributions. I won't be needing 'em, and I can't transfer them to anyone else.



JD should know better .
 
The man responsible for increasing the state pension age to 67 retired at 61 with a £245k lump sum and £85k a year.

petition.parliament.uk

Archived Petition: Force Robert Deveraux to work to state pension age. He’s the man that made it 67

Sir Robert Deveraux is retiring at age 61 after increasing our state pension age to 67. He retires with a £245,000 lump sum and £85,000 per year, that’s a £1.8M pension pot. Why should ordinary hard working people work themselves to death so that he can put his feet up in the sun on tax payers money
petition.parliament.uk petition.parliament.uk
 
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