WASPI

That is one extra year; the age for retirement was until very recently is 65 and I have never been able to understand why some women think they are entitled to work five years less than men to gain their state pension.
Equality for women? Then equality for men also.

I am awaiting my first pension payment in feb after having to work an extra six years. I do hope it goes in after my long wait! 😂

Nannynoodles

I can’t remember if I did or didn’t to be honest but I certainly knew about it because it was all over the news and in the papers.
I was born in ‘58 so had to wait an extra 6 years so definitely not happy about it but I can understand why it had to happen .
But what I can’t understand though is wether you got a letter or not what actual difference would it have made to most women,
How would you have been more prepared - would you have looked for a better job? Paid more into your own private pension?

I am one of the ones that certainly did not have that letter.

Maybe the difference between those who did get a letter and those who didn't boiled down to which office was actually sending the letter? Efficient offices sent one. CBA offices didnt send one?

Am so glad I read a newspaper article telling me all about it at that time. I wouldnt have known otherwise for sure and that would have been one heck of a shock. As it is I had duly thought "the ******s".

But I read that article when it happened - ie in my 40's and my first reaction was incredulity - as in "They can't do that to people as old as myself - we've already put in most of our worklife and are looking forward to 60".

As for me doing any preparation for this = I'd started buying myself extra job pension about 10 years before we were notified. That was done not to cater for being told that news in my 40's - instead it was because I didn't have any job pension prior to my 30's and so decided to get max possible job pension (especially as it might land up based on such a low income job) and the plan was to have a full job pension and a full State Pension. In the event that job pension (even poorer than I'd anticipated - when I'd thought it would be better!!!!!!!) had to do as my sole pension for about the first 3 years of my retirement. It wasnt enough to cover the missing State Pension too and I wasn't being paid enough to live on. So my pension lump sum and leftover house equity from starter house had to do three tasks in the event:
- subsidise my job pension up to enough to live on
- cover renovation work on current house
- be savings for Me personally

It wasn't up to the task and, by the time, I got to that revised State Pension Age I'd had to spend every bit of my savings and that leftover house equity money from first house and the work on my house was still far from finished. I felt I couldnt wait any longer for the kitchen to be done and to buy the couple of new sofas I needed - so I went ahead and got them (cue for every month for some time I was paying loan payments on my new kitchen and the sofas had been bought on interest-free credit). I was around £18,000 in debt! - though I'd cleared the debt from my low income years before - but the debt I got thrown into pretty much equated to my stolen State Pension to the penny. I reckon I wouldnt have landed up with any debt if they'd paid me that missing income - so my savings would have gone (ie on the house)...but at least I wouldnt have been in debt. So I just mentally detached from the debt and didnt "own" it mentally as mine and regarded it as "That's down to the government - not me".

In hindsight - what else could I do? and, if I'd known Lockdown was going to be put on us I'd have been even more convinced I needed to go ahead and at least finish the necessities on the house. So - thank goodness I ignored the "I've got to go THAT much in debt !!!!! Eek" in order to have a house that was reasonably fit to live in - whilst I waited for the stuff I could more easily wait for (ie garden revamp/replacing two exterior doors/adding a conservatory). Lockdown was miserable - but at least I'd got a manageable home to live in (if not finished at the time) and it was that little bit easier to cope with mentally than it would have been if I'd not done that.

Basically - I see distinct advantages to managing practically from the way I've been turned so cynical about others over the years - as I often "see them coming and plan accordingly". My added job pension plans would have been substantially ruined if I weren't a cynic - as there were a couple of options I could use to get myself some more of that and I looked at one of the options and thought "They should never ever let me down on either of them. It's their responsibility not to do that to us" and then thought "I don't trust them - so I'll take the option they can't be irresponsible about and none of their useless planning/"blow the staff" attitude can hurt me". The scheme I went in for was safe (I couldnt see how they could manage to steal any of that money off me basically - and they indeed couldnt) and the scheme I skirted round did steal (a lot!) from the people in it. I was gobsmacked they'd treated people that way and horrified - but at least I was saved by my cynicism from being one of them. So very thankful I had already evaluated them as "very far from nice people" (putting it extremely tactfully to avoid the swear filter).

Overthemoongran

I did know about the first increase in age and I was prepared for it. BUT, it was the second increase, with so little notice that made a mockery of my forward planning.

Yes, that was Tory Iain Duncan Smith saving the government £30 billion between 2016 and 2025.

The National Insurance Fund into which our NIC goes and out of which our pensions are paid now sits with a £76 billion surplus. That's £40 billion more than needs to be there. The surplus is mean to be a short term annual contingency against temporary shortfalls in NIC receipts.

That surplus is now used to service government debt.

Re WASPI - can I presume that all of you who were aware of the changes to state pension age will not take up any compensation (should it be offered) as you had made provision to address any shortfall

I did know about the first increase in age and I was prepared for it. BUT, it was the second increase, with so little notice that made a mockery of my forward planning.

Just because you keep spouting this doesn't make away front the fact that it was all over the place. ££££

Women’s State Pension age: our findings on injustice and associated issues

www.ombudsman.org.uk/sites/default/files/Women%E2%80%99s-State-Pension-age-our-findings-on-injustice-and-associated-issues.pdf

This argument that just because you knew then others must have done too is illogical. People’s lives are lived differently.

The PHSO investigated this for over five years and determined there was maladministration. All the reasons are there in the reports and sample case histories you say you have read. Therefore you must know what those failings were and how people have been affected.

The PHSO’s recommendations for compensation means that few women will get anything. Few would be able to claim even level 3 injustice let alone level 6 but some will have. It is about those.

Have some compassion.

Joanofarc99

I cannot recall if I got a letter but it was all over the news....come on! You'd have to be a hermit not too know, was massively talked about. Lot of people with selective amnesia hoping for ££££

Well said. I have followed the WASPI saga for years being myself born in the 1950s and so have read PHSO reports etc etc. At times I have been embarrassed for some 1950s born women who are obviously simply wanting some compo. Personally I remember listening to the Budget on the radio, sat in an office in the 1990s and groaning when I heard my state pension age was going to be increased. It was the constant subject of conversation with friends of similar age and basically we just got on with it. School Reunions it was a gripe but the conclusion was always well we are working until we are 65/66 like the guys have to. I'm much more concerned with the injustices like the Post Office Scandal and the infected blood scandal are righted and those folk are quickly compensated.

Born in 1958, I didn’t receive a letter.

I didn't get one

Doodledog

I couldn’t remember if I’d got a letter or not, so put in an FOI request (as advised by WASPI). I didn’t get one.

I did this too, no letter.

First post should say the Conservatives in 1995.

Just what letters are people refering to here? I never received a letter when the original legislation was passed by the Conservatives.in

Nor did anybody l know.

I also did not see any TV programs at. Newspaper Adverts at that time about to he change.

Funny when asked about producing these adverts successive Governments could not produced them.

Because Labour sat on it for years and kept it really hushed up. Really tells you everything you need to know about them.

Firstl heard about was through the Coalition Govt who had the decency to write to me and tell me that my retirement age had been increased by 4 years and 9 months.

This was later increased by 15 months to 6 years.. Six years added My birth day was a few months from the end of the tranche of women who were born after April 5 1950 before April 5 1955

Yes at this stage there was lots of publicity as it was now made transparent for everybody

Please refer to the Pension Act of 1995 and previous Pension Acts.

This group were always promised a retirement at 60. Don't think anybody else born on the 1950's was.

The proposed change in the retirement age had been mentioned for years before it happened and I have always been astonished that so many women claim to have been unaware.

It was discussed everywhere- on the tv news, in newspapers and talked about generally amongst friends and family.

I didn’t actually get a letter but I most certainly knew it was happening!

Not at all ,*joanofarc*.
I don’t know anyone who did get a letter maybe it was a postcode thing .Some of us had very busy lives so of we didn,t watch news or buy newspapers we wouldn,t have known
I, e employed the same accountant since the early1980,s and on questioning him HE wasn,t notified about the change to my pension age either !
I,ve seen these insinuations on here before …I am either stupid nor work shy
I have worked since I was15 never taken maternity leave and always paid my tax and NI….by my accountant to reckoning the Thieves in Downing St owe me inexcess of £52k.
I won’t hold my breathe.,

I didn’t get a letter.

Graphite...you are rude...but I'll forgive you, probably down to a lack of intelligence which you can't help

You wouldn't if you were born after May 1955.

Graphite thank you for that explanation.
I was born in 1957 and can't remember getting a letter, so that explains why.

I was very aware of the changes as they came in as I had a friend who was older than me, I think born in 1953.
She was very annoyed about it all because she had to wait for her pension, but still got the old rate.
I had to wait longer, but get the new rate.

Joanofarc99. Do please read the PHSO report before spouting rubbish like this.

I cannot recall if I got a letter but it was all over the news....come on! You'd have to be a hermit not too know, was massively talked about. Lot of people with selective amnesia hoping for ££££

I did receive a letter in advance, advising that I would not receive my pension until 63. I had also read about the change beforehand in the newspapers.

You wouldn't if you were born after May 1955.

The first stage of the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman’s report, published in July 2021, - specifically the section “What did happen” not the section “What should have happened”, clearly states:

114. The proposed schedule for issuing letters included women who turned 60 between April 2010 and May 2015. We have seen no evidence of what – if anything – DWP proposed to do to tell women who turned 60 after May 2015 whose State Pension age had increased to 65 under the Pensions Act 1995.

www.ombudsman.org.uk/publications/womens-state-pension-age-our-findings-department-work-and-pensions-communication/what-did-happen

I fall just outside that cut off.

What I did get, after my husband died in 2007, was a letter from the DWP Pensions Service which tells me that I will receive my State Pension at age 60. It is accompanied by leaflet BB1 imprint 2006 (BB is Bereavement Benefit) which says State Pension age for men is 65 and women 60.

The Pension Service knew my age as what was paid in BB was dependent on the age of the widow(er). Younger than 55 (which I was) the rate was reduced.

This letter and leaflet were sent twelve years after the Pensions Act 1995 and only three years before the first women affected by the changes were due to turn 60 and would see their pension age increase.

In other words, just three years before the changes came into effect, the Pensions Service weren't just not telling some women. Worse than that, it was still sending out personal letters and general leaflets which made no reference to the changes affecting women born after 5 April 1950.

Just a few months later in 2007, a new Pensions Act would increase the SP age to 66.

I couldn’t remember if I’d got a letter or not, so put in an FOI request (as advised by WASPI). I didn’t get one.

I didn't get a letter. I knew from the news on tv that changes were being considered, but it wasn't until I started working in a job with lots of other women that I discovered the changes had actually been implemented.