Because of errors with state pension payments, over 200,000 retirees have been left out of pocket by a total of £1.3 billion.
The Department of Work and Pensions has been accused of being “asleep at the switch” after faults with National Insurance records resulted in massive inaccuracies spanning decades.
According to DWP estimates, the 210,000 people affected are owed an average of £5,000 in back wages.
Dame Meg Hillier MP, Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said: “Many pensioners have been left significantly out of pocket by up to thousands, while DWP has been asleep at the switch. These are injustices that may never be corrected for some. We are now in a place where Parliament needs assurance that the State Pension is being paid accurately.”
She added: “Frankly, paying pension accurately is a basic that we expect from DWP and not recommendations that our Committee ought to be having to make.”
Those affected were previously eligible for the Home Responsibilities Protection benefit, but their National Insurance records include gaps.
HM Revenue & Customs, which is in charge of administering the records, has cautioned that it will be “very difficult” to identify anyone who has been affected.
It intends to contact those it believes are affected and invite them to file a claim for HRP. It will then amend the National Insurance record, allowing the DWP to pay back any lost State Pension.
The underpayments follow the finding last year that 165,000 pensioners had missed out on £1.2 billion due to DWP blunders in the past.
Who is entitled to extra state pension cash?
Hundreds of thousands of people have not been paid enough state pension because there were wrongly gaps in their National Insurance record because they did not get Home Responsibilities Protection even though they were entitled to it.
It is estimated 210,000 people are due an average back payment of £5,000 each.
What was Home Responsibilities Protection?
Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP) was a scheme to help protect parents’ and carers’ State Pension. National Insurance credits replaced HRP in 2010. You’ll have received HRP automatically if between 6 April 1978 and 5 April 2010 you were claiming:
– Child Benefit for a child under 16
– Income Support because you were looking after a sick or disabled person and were not available for work.
You’ll need to apply for HRP if you think it’s missing from your National Insurance (NI) record.
Who can apply?
You may still be able to apply for HRP if, for full tax years (6 April to 5 April) between 1978 and 2010, you were either:
– sharing the care of a child under 16 with a partner you lived with and they claimed Child Benefit instead of you – you may be able to transfer their HRP
– caring for a sick or disabled person.
You can also apply if, for a full tax year between 2003 and 2010, you were either:
– a foster carer
– caring for a friend or family member’s child (‘kinship carer’) in Scotland.
Find out more details on the Government website.