State pensioners aged over 65 are being urged to verify whether they’re entitled to as much as £7,000 following a significant ‘underpayment’ blunder.
A mistake by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has resulted in thousands of women receiving less than they should have.
Those affected include widows, divorcees and women whose state pension entitlement relies partly on their husband’s National Insurance contributions.
Also eligible are women who reached state pension age prior to April 2016 and those aged 80 or above.
The problem was first highlighted by pensions consultancy firm Lane, Clarke & Peacock (LCP) in May 2020, with an official repayment scheme launching in January 2021.
The blunder stems from computer system failures combined with the DWP’s failure to uplift women’s state pension payments when their husbands reached state pension age, when they themselves turned 80, or following their husband’s death.
If you reached 65 after April 2016, you’ll be receiving the new state pension rate, meaning the underpayment does not affect you.
The DWP maintains it contacted affected women, but many insist they received no correspondence whatsoever, which explains why substantial sums remain unclaimed.
It’s thought many women died without ever being paid what they were rightfully owed.
More than 230,000 women are estimated to have been shortchanged, according to former pensions minister Sir Steve Webb.
He said: “The vast majority of those who lost were women, some of whom were underpaid for decades or even went to their grave never paid the right state pension.
“The remaining corrections need to be handled as a matter of urgency. This should never be allowed to happen again.”
Data reveals that 130,948 pensioners above State Pension age, the majority of whom are women, have already received their repayments.
According to Homecare, the sums recovered range from £2,192 to £12,486, depending on individual pension brackets.
The Parliamentary Ombudsman has launched a formal investigation into the matter, following concerns raised by LCP that many women were unaware they needed to submit a separate claim to boost their pension once their husband had retired.
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This requirement had only been referenced on their husband’s state pension application form.