Britons are urged to check their state pension records, as they could be missing out on thousands of pounds in retirement.
For this tax year 2023/2024 the full amount of state pension is worth £203.85 a week or £10,600.20 a year, however many pensioners are getting less than £100 a week.
To ensure people can receive the full amount, they are urged to check their National Insurance record to check their qualifying years.
People can find out an estimate of how much state pension they will receive online. This can be done for free through the Government’s state pension forecast tool.
The tool is available to anyone who has not yet reached state pension age.
The forecast tool provides an idea of how much state pension someone is due to get once they become eligible by reaching state pension age. State pension age is currently 66 in the UK for both men and women.
The state pension is based on National Insurance (NI) contributions. The more qualifying years someone has, the more state pension they will be able to get.
To get the full state pension, 35 years of NI contributions may be required, and 10 years are needed to get anything at all.
Qualifying years are accumulated through working but can also be earned by receiving certain benefits or making voluntary contributions.
A full National Insurance year usually costs £824 and adds up to £275 each year to your pre-tax state pension.
People can usually purchase NI contributions up to six years ago, as far back as 2017/2018 at present.
But the scheme is currently extended by another 10 years meaning people can buy contributions as far back as 2007/2008.
Interactive Investor calculated that somebody purchasing 10 years of NI contributions at the cost of £9,070, could increase their state pension by £77,400 over a 20-year retirement, £33,946 over 10 years and £15,927 over five years.
The online system doesn’t take long to use, and people could be able to find out when they can claim the state pension within a matter of seconds.
People can find out their state pension age, their pension credit qualifying age and when they’ll be eligible for free bus travel.
Britons can follow the instructions on the Government website and put in their details to get the information.
State pensioners could secure another large increase to their payments when the triple lock triggers this year, despite inflation falling to 7.9 percent last week.
David Pye, director at leading independent consultancy Broadstone, said: “It looks likely that the state pension will rise above £11,000 next year which will further embed its importance as the foundation of pensioners’ income.
“At this current rate of increase, it won’t be long before retirees start tripping over the £12,500 income tax threshold solely based on the state pension.”
The full new state pension would need to increase by around four percent for payments to hit £11,000 a year – a four percent increase would boost payments by £424 a year to a total of £11,024.
With a seven percent increase, the full new state pension would increase by £742 a year to £11,342.
