State pensioner 'staggered' to receive £77k DWP lump-sum in error
One elderly Briton was awarded a whopping £77,000 after the error occurred.
A state pensioner was "staggered" to receive £77k from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in a lump-sum error.
One elderly Briton was awarded £77,000 after it did not automatically boost her state pension once her husband had retired.
Tean Hatt, an IFA at Vizion Wealth, told FT Adviser how a client had come to him for help with his pension planning. His wife was 73 and retired in 2011 aged 60, after working for his company and being paid a low wage for "National Insurance purposes".
Hatt said this has been his “biggest win” for a client from the DWP in relation to a state pension.
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Rules were put in place by the DWP that meant married women over state pension age could claim an enhanced rate of basic state pension when their spouse or civil partner reached state pension age in cases where they had only a small basic state pension entitlement in their own right.
However, after a rule change, for any spouse reaching state pension age after March 17 2008, the uplift to a married woman’s pension should have happened automatically, without the need for a separate claim.
If this didn’t happen the married woman could subsequently claim the uplift, which could be backdated to the date her spouse or civil partner reached state pension age.
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The woman had retired in 2019 aged 65 but had not received an uplift nor was she aware that she could claim for such a thing.
As a result of DWP's “error" the woman was awarded the £130 per week which was backdated to when she retired at 60 by a lump sum of £77,393.
The DWP said it has received more than 700,000 cases similar to this owing a total of £571.6mn.