admin, Author at Retirement Age

22 Sep

Retirement Age – Born in 1974

Born in 1974 (Updated March 2023)

If you were born in 1974 then you may be wondering at what age you are able to retire.

There have been many changes in State Pension age over the last few years and decades and it has become quite confusing to many people as to when they will be able to get their State Pension.

There may be different rules in place for when you are able to draw your personal pension or company pension benefits and you will need to contact the scheme administrator if you are not sure, or you could check your documentation. Read More

6 Jul

Retirement Age – Born in 1973

Born in 1973 (Updated March 2023)

If you were born in 1973 then you may be wondering what your retirement age is.

By retirement age in this context we mean state pension age, i.e. the date or age at which you are first allowed to claim your state pension and get the benefits that you have earned through your previous NI payments.

There may be different rules in place for what age you are able to draw your personal pension or workplace pension benefits and you will need to contact your scheme administrator if you are not sure, or check your documentation. Read More

15 Jun

New Review of State Pension Ages

On 1 March 2016 the government instigated a new review of State Pension Ages for anyone retiring after April 2028. Currently anyone born between April 1961 and March 1977 has a retirement age of 67 so this may mean that any changes that the review brings up will affect anyone born after April 1961 and may increase their retirement age further.

Those born after March 1977 currently have a retirement age of 68 and so it is possible that this will be increased or else it is possible that a further age group is going to be given a higher retirement age. For the first time it might even be possible that a State Pension Age of 70 is introduced for those who are pretty young at the moment.

The purpose of the review is state as follows:

The purpose of the independent review of State Pension age is to make recommendations to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions on future State Pension age arrangements. These recommendations should be affordable in the long term, fair to current and future generations of pensioners, and consistent with supporting fuller working lives.

The implications of this are that the State Pension Age will indeed be increased which would allow for longer working lives and also reduce the burden on the taxpayers as they are the ones that actually pay for the pensions in payment (as the system works on a Pay As You Go basis).

The review will be considering:

What a suitable State Pension age is, in the immediate future and over the longer term;
Whether the current system of a universal State Pension age rising in line with life expectancy best supports affordability, fairness, and fuller working lives objectives;
And, if not, how State Pension age arrangements might better support these objectives.

The review will consult with relevant parties and will come up with its findings by January 2017, so there is a while to go before any changes are announced and after this, legislation will need to be put in place for any of those changes to apply. this gives just over a year for that to happen as anyone affected by those changes needs to be given at least 10 years notice of changes to their State Pension Age, so they will need to be notified by 2018.

The review of state pension ages is an ongoing procedure and this will not be the last one. In fact the 2014 Pensions Act requires the State Pension age to be reviewed during each Parliament. This review is being undertaken by an independent appointee, namely John Cridland CBE who was most recently Director General of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). He is currently Chair of the Board of Transport for the North. He has previously helped to negotiate the UK’s first national minimum wage, spent 10 years on the Low Pay Commission and he was also a member of the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS).

6 Apr

Online State Pension Forecast Tool

HMRC have introduced a tool that will calculate your expected State Pension for you online. This was first introduced in 2016 in beta mode and has gone through some testing and is now a useful tool to see how much you might get when you retire based on contributions to date and future contributions.

In order to use the State pension forecaster you will need to have your identification verified. You can logon using a government gateway ID if you have one and you will then be sent an access code to your mobile phone to verify your identity.

The pension forecast tool worked pretty quickly for us – it came up with 2 figures – a weekly amount based on the current state pension and any future contributions you need to make (this is also converted to a monthly and annual figure) – and also a weekly amount based on National Insurance contributions paid to date.

It may be the case that the online system is unable to give you a current figure but in the majority of cases it can be a very useful tool to see what income you might be able to get and also what date this will be paid from.

You can also find out the following information:

your National Insurance number
details of your National Insurance record and years missed
how you can improve your state pension – i.e. you may be able to make up years where you have not paid enough NI.

This is a really quick and easy way to get an estimate of the amount of pension you may get and replaces the old system of sending off a form and requesting the amount although you can still request the information this way if you need to.

You can access the online pension forecast tool here.

23 Mar

Retirement Age – Born in 1972

Born in 1972 (Updated March 2023)

For those of you born in 1972, you may be wondering when is your retirement age?

There have been many changes in the last few years in terms of the age at which people can draw their State pension in the UK. Pension ages started at 60 for women and 65 for men but have already been equalised upwards for women and now both men and women are faced with retiring at ever higher ages. Read More

21 Mar

Retirement Age – Born in 1971

Born in 1971 (Updated March 2023)

If you were born in 1971 then you may be wondering when your retirement age is. And in this context we are talking about the age that you can take your State pension benefits in the UK.

There have been quite a few changes to retirement ages since the state pension was introduced when men retired at 65 and women retired at age 60. Since then retirement ages have been equalised between men and women and also increased. Read More

18 Mar

Retirement Age – Born in 1970

Born in 1970 (Updated March 2023)

The subject of retirement ages has become very complicated in recent years as the government sets out to equalise state pension ages between men and women. So if you were born in 1970 then you may be wondering when is your retirement age?

Initially men and women had retirement ages of 65 and 60 respectively but the retirement age was changed for women to 65 and subsequently for both men and women has been increased beyond this. Read More

17 Mar

Retirement Age – Born in 1969

When Can I Retire?

Were you were born in 1969 and you are wondering when you can retire?

Well it firstly depends on whether you are thinking about when you can take you personal or occupational pension benefits, or whether you are wondering when you can claim your state pension.

For non-state pension benefits, the minimum age at which you can start taking your money out is age 55 (apart from special situations like in serious ill health when other rules may apply). Although for some pensions you may not get penalised for taking benefits early so you may wish to wait as long as possible before claiming pension benefits. Read More

16 Mar

Is the Minimum Retirement Age Increasing to 60?

In his budget today George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced a new Lifetime ISA which was aimed at helping younger people to save more for their retirement (or for a first home purchase). The age at which the proceeds of the Lifetime ISA could be taken for retirement purposes (if the government bonus was included in the proceeds) was set at age 60.

For this reason we are asking ‘is the minimum retirement age going to increase to age 60?’ This new product could well be the start of the introduction all round of a pensions style ISA. It is only available to those who are under the age of 40 so is aimed at younger savers initially.

Currently, the minimum age for taking savings from a personal pension is age 55 so the logical question to ask is will this be increased to age 60 at any time soon? The answer we believe is probably yes. It may not be in the next couple of years but it seems very likely that in the medium term the minimum retirement age will be 60, if not even higher.

Retirement ages are likely to keep in line in some way at least, with the increase in the State Pension Age, so increases are likely to come on an ongoing basis, although the highest state pension age announced so far is 68, so it may be some time before the minimum pension age is increased past age 60.

The fact that the Lifetime ISA has been introduced with a retirement age of 60 may indicate that it is not to long for other financial products to follow suit.

However, it is only possible to save £4,000 a year into a Lifetime ISA so it is also possible that there is a bit of a way to go before this replaces the current pensions system, if indeed it does. Contribution limits would need to be increased to enable people to save up a reasonable amount of money for their retirement.

Anyone who is eligible for the Lifetime ISA in 2017 is going to have a state pension age of 68 (or possibly 67+ if they were born in 1977/78) so they would be eligible to withdraw their savings around 8 years before their state pension was due for payment. Some may have an even higher state pension age if those are increased in future years.

17 Feb

Retirement Age – Born in 1968

Born in 1968

Were you born in 1968 and are you wondering what your retirement age is? (And by retirement age we mean the age at which you can claim your state pension). If you are in this situation then it does not matter if you are a man or a woman as retirement ages have been equalised so you will both have the same retirement age. Read More

Author: admin