Ministers have issued an update on the work to reimburse those who were underpaid their state pension.
Pensions minister Laura Trott said HMRC will be contacting people in September who may have missed payments due to errors with the Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP) scheme.
The DWP estimated some 210,000 people have been underpaid by this, with the error mostly affecting women who received Child Benefit before 2010 and whose National Insurance record was not updated to include their HRP entitlement.
In response to a Parliamentary question, Ms Trott said: “In September, HMRC will begin contacting people potentially affected by missing HRP.
“This will be supported by a communications campaign to increase public awareness and encourage people to see if they are affected.
“DWP will then revise the state pension awards of people who may have been affected.”
Officials also estimate that some 165,000 state pensioners have been underpaid because of historical errors related to married women, widows and people aged over 80.
Ms Trott said officials have reviewed an average of 30,000 cases each month between November 2022 and March 2023.
She explained: “Based on our current trajectory, the department expects to complete the exercise for Category BL and Category D cases by the end of 2023. For missed conversion cases, the exercise could run through to late 2024.”
Category BL refers to the lower basic state pension, who reached state pension age before April 6, 2016. People in this category may have been underpaid if they did not get an increase they were due through their husband, wife or civil partner.
Category D refers to people on the over 80 state pension rate – people who received less than this amount may be owed money.
More than 1,300 staff have been tasked with going through state pension underpayment cases
A person can check how much state pension they are entitled to using the state pension forecast tool on the Government website.
The full basic state pension is currently £156.20 a week while the full new state pension is £203.85 a week.
An individual may be able to increase their payments by voluntarily paying National Insurance contributions.
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