Saturday 2 February 2013

Pensions Part II

Following on from my post yesterday, I found this link here quite useful if you are in a similar predicament to me and are not sure whether it is worthwhile paying voluntary contributions. Judging by what I have read, it would seem I would be better off paying although I don't know yet, whether I would get the current or the new rate and that would have a bearing on my decision.

If you are in the position where it is now too late to pay them, this link here may or may not be useful to you. I followed the procedure as a married woman, I have no idea what the situation would be in you are living together. Again, check this link if you are in that situation.

My mother in law only had a small pension but as she was 10 years older than her husband, had to wait until he had retired before she got anything - doesn't seem fair does it? Luckily, her husband was in the Forces and received part of his pension after he died, for the duration of her life.

The other point for you all to ponder is, what will you have to live on as a pensioner, if you are living on the pension of your husband, if he were to die before you?

You may think me obsessed by the question, but I am not, I am merely thinking ahead. Let's face it, I could go before him so it wouldn't matter as he currently draws his pension and that is what we live on. No more money will enter this house for quite a few years yet.

If you live mainly on his pension and yours is/will be 'just' the state pension (however much that might be), do you know if his private pension dies with him or whether you would be entitled to any of it after he has gone? If you don't know the answer to that, maybe you should try and find out.

Thanks for all your comments from yesterday. Jo, if you read this today, I would be interested to know, if they told you the cut off birth date for those of us who will be affected by now having to contribute 35 rather than 30 years. 









4 comments:

  1. USEFUL TIP
    if you are going online to check it out, do not use CHROME as your browser, it is prone to failure. Tia, the helpful lady on the helpdesk advised trying an alternative browser, and apologised- she said they were sorry so many people were struggling with this one!
    Now waiting for activation code in post so I can check my pension forecast.
    THANKYOU for the reminder about this one! x

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  2. I certainly don't think you are obsessed you are being sensible.
    One point for people who are living together, with some private schemes if your partner starts to draw his pension it could die with him even if you marry after he retires. Always worth checking all terms and conditions.
    We are both glad that we "had to" pay superannuation from being young even though, at the time, we believed we could have made better use of the cash(e.g. paying mortgage and other bills).
    Carol xx

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  3. I don't think you're obsessed, just trying to keep up with a game where the goalposts are forever shifting.

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  4. Hi
    I don't know the cut off date for the 30 or 35 year problem - sorry. I'll try to remember to ask when I ring them up again. I had my pension forecast come yesterday and I'm thrilled that they have decided that I have the necessary 35 years. I'm not sure what years they have decided are valid because I don't get it to add to 35 but I'm not complaining!!! But I think I ought to ask and check just in case...

    ReplyDelete

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