It has been confirmed that thousands of state pensioners are set to receive an additional £5,600. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has provided an update on its ongoing initiative to rectify State Pension payments.
The Legal Entitlements and Administrative Practice (LEAP) exercise, which will continue until the end of the year, has so far addressed underpayments for pensioners who are either married or over 80.
The DWP found that a staggering £736 million is owed to those receiving too little or no pension at all.
Those with insufficient National Insurance contributions to qualify for any Basic State Pension may be entitled to a pension through their spouse’s NI contributions, known as a Category BL State Pension, potentially providing them with a Basic State Pension of up to £101.55 a week (at 2024-2025 rates).
Furthermore, individuals aged 80 and above who are receiving no Basic State Pension or less than the full amount can qualify for a Category D State Pension, boosting their entitlement to £101.55 a week.
Due to government errors, thousands have missed out on these amounts. The DWP has reviewed the cases of over 321,000 married pensioners and identified nearly 46,000 underpayments totalling £250.6 million.
This means average arrears of just under £5,600 have been dispatched, reports Birmingham Live.
In the category of those over 80, nearly 91,000 cases have been scrutinised. Over £68 million has been disbursed to more than 33,000 individuals, with each recipient receiving an average of £2,200.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) stated that these two sets of completed underpayment corrections mean almost 80,000 pensioners should by now have received up to £5,600 – and in some cases more – in their bank accounts.
The DWP further added that thousands more elderly people are also set to be repaid missing sums by the end of next month. These are individuals who are widowed and receive a Basic State Pension of less than £169.50 a week (in 2024-2025 rates) but may also be able to derive pension entitlement from their late spouse or civil partner.
This could then increase their Basic State Pension to up to £169.50 a week. This group can also inherit between 50 per cent and 100 per cent of any Additional State Pension and 50 per cent of any Graduated Retirement Benefit.
So far, £417 million has been repaid to widowed pensioners after almost 40,000 of 445,000 cases were found to be incorrect, with these underpayments set to be completed by the end of this year.
Two other types of State Pension errors are also under investigation. These include cases where Home Responsibilities Protection is missing from the records of stay-at-home parents and carers who did not include a National Insurance number on their Child Benefit claim.
Other instances involve Universal Credit claimants who could be receiving less than their full pension entitlement because their National Insurance credits were not processed by HMRC.
