Featured Old Age Pensioner

Are you actually a full weight, drawing state pension pensioner or just drawing a private pension?
I’m drawing my Fire Service pension but not a full weight state pensioner yet. I’ve another 3 years to go to full time pensioner yet. Just a trainee pensioner at the moment.

 

I'm 2yrs away from my SP, currently drawing a private pension since 2020. Fortunately I have virtually full NI contributions so will get, near as dammit, full SP (single person). As I understand it, If you have a deceased spouse who has paid NI contributions in the past you should be able to claim at least part of their SP entitlement, hence the requirement for documentation.

 

It’s quite funny you having to claim your state pension. A very good mate was telling us last time we had a night out about that. He (nor I) knew one needed to claim state pension, he just assumed that when he reached pension age it would be automatically paid. At least some paperwork sent to him, but no he needed to claim it. It was all backdated to his birthday though.
Congratulations on reaching retirement Joe. You’ve earned it so enjoy it.

 

I just scraped in for SP at 66. If I'd been born 4 months later I'd have had to wait until 67.
My Mum is 90 and gets a widow's SP which is taxable of course so she gets a tax bill from HMRC every year as they are unable to tax SP at source unlike private pensions.

 

Nice one Joe, you'll wonder how you ever had the time for work once you pack it in. I've been drawing my company pension since 2015 and got my state pension too just over a year ago but as I was already paying tax on my company one I have to pay tax on all my state one, though the tax man takes that from my company one instead. If anyone hasn't got enough qualifying years in to get their full state pension (if you were contracted out you need to check) you may be able to buy extra years depending on your circumstances, which if you can is well worth it if you think you're going to live beyond the pay back period (which for a basic rate tax payer is less than 3 years) I'm due to get my winter fuel allowance too soon

 

Well, I'm 67 now but retired from the railway at 60. So I had some savings and the railway pension which is OK but not as good as lots of people think it is. Anyway, yes, you have to claim the state pension because it is possible to defer it if you wish.
My advice is to get an estimate by going onto the .gov website and check it thoroughly because you might have underpaid if you were contracted out of SERPS. If you were, then it's worth topping up if you can afford it because you'll get that money back in 3 years or so through a bigger state pension.
Retirement is great overall. Loving being able to do what I want, when I want without work (four letter word) getting in the way.

 

@joe mc donald
Congratulations, Joe! Glad to hear you're "officially" retired. But, hmmm, I suspect "it feels no different" as you said because you're still working until April! But that will come sooner than you know it.

It sounds like retirement across the pond is relatively complicated. It is here in the U.S., too. One of the interesting things on my side of the pond (in Arizona, not sure about other states) is that if you work for the state, you can officially retire when you acrue a certain number of points based on your age plus your years of service. Then you start drawing your retirement pension. But...if you wait for one year, you can be a "return to work" employee which means you can go back to work, continue drawing your retirement, and make your new salary. Both Steve and I did just that. We do get financially "dinged" a bit by the state since we're drawing retirement but not contributing. But our school district splits the amount the state gets so it's not a huge amount off your salary. Part of that is that there is a shortage in nearly every educator position in Arizona.

I hope you can begin to taper off, Joe, and really start doing more of the things you love and spending time with the people you love! Again, congratulations!

 

In the UK there are no restrictions on returning to work after starting to draw either your government or company pension. If you work for Local Government, which our state educators do, you can choose to retire at 50, irrespective of the number years you have accrued. Obviously the number of years you have will determine the amount of pension you draw. They work on a 40/80ths rule i.e. you need 40 years service to get a 50% pension based on final salary.

 

My private company pension used to be locked until you were 60 with compulsory retirement at that age but that changed when the pension laws were reformed a few years back. I could have retired at 55 or, indeed, carried on working indefinitely but decided 60 was enough. As I'm already paying tax on my pension (which really p*sses me off) even a part time job in a bike shop couldn't tempt me. Death and taxes, as they say.

 

Totally agree but when you think about it a full state pension is within the personal allowance (tax free, for the benefit of others). So it’s only your company/private pensions that are getting taxed and the contributions you have made during all those years was exempt from tax. Effectively rather than pay tax when you contributed you pay it when you draw it down.

OK, you would expect the total of your pension fund to exceed the total of the contributions but that cannot be avoided unless your fund managers are inept.

I fight HMRC (UK income tax authority) for every last halfpenny, and so should everybody else.

 

Welcome to the "over the hill gang" Joe. It will be 15 yrs. retirement for me as of the end of December. I really did not think I would live this long, but retirement has been a boon to my health. I had been pushing it too hard for many years. I suggest you stay active but remember to get some down time. Retirement takes some getting used to. Even the wife and you will have some adjusting to the new situation. Congratulations. Stay healthy. ...J.D.

 

Congrats Joe. Enjoy retirement.

I turned 60 in June this year and unfortunately having to still work. I'd love to retire but hanging on for a couple of years in the hope of a redundancy pay out as I've got a long service and my wife (SWMBO ) has told me I can't retire yet... just in case of a pay out. Hate to admit that my wife is correct.... as always!

Good to see how many good folks on this forum are already retired. Good on you all. I can't wait to join the retirement club. At least I have all my NI contributions paid to claim a full SP, but that's still 6.5 years away, but encouraging to see most of you are drawing down your private pensions in the meantime. I like that plan.

Wish me luck on being made redundant soon

 

I was contracted out during my early years of employment (it wasn't my choice!) so when I took early voluntary redundancy I'd paid NI for 44 years, yet still woukdn't get a full state pension so I took the Martin Lewis advice and paid the extra voluntary contributions to increase it to just under a full one (the last year wasn't worth buying because I'd have had to pay for the full year even though I was only a few weeks short of full entitlement and it would have taken 25 years to get that back) The payback for what I contributed extra for is under 3 years and with the increases due to the triple lock it's even less now so although I think he's a bit of a twat I owe him a beer if I ever meet him.

 

I too was contracted out so I don't get a full state pension but I'm not a million miles out. However, I did retire at fifty six and three quarters on my private pension. What pisses me off though, unless i've mis-understood things is, NI is percentage based, so, because my salary was ok, I would have paid more NI than someone on a lower salary but who will get a full state pension. Well maybe it doesn't piss me off but it doesn't seem quite fair.

 

One of the most unfair things is that some people only have to make 35 years of contributions to get a full pension. So why do people like us have to make extra payments even though we've paid in for over 40 years? Surely those extra years payments should be put towards the lack of NI payment due to being contracted out?

 

The full basic State Pension is £156.20 per week and you need 30 qualifying years.
The full new State Pension is £203.85 per week and you need 35 qualifying years.

With retirement you will still never have enough time and you need to treat it like starting a new job, that is to do as you are told.

 

If/when I start drawing my SP at 66 I will be paying tax on ALL of it at 20% as I'm already over the personal allowance threshhold so the additional tax due will be taken from my private pension. I'm also over the personal allowance for savings interest (excluding ISA's) so I've just paid a tax bill (not unexpected) for that. I'm gradually moving more savings into ISA's, subject to annual limits of course but I agree with Baza, get tax savvy!!