A GRANDMA has won back £1,000 in extra state pension for 12 years after the government told her she was only owed £1,248 in total.
Daphne Bennett, 80, was one of thousands of women affected by a state pension underpayment that saw them miss out on £1,000s.
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The landmark case offers hope for those who were affected by the same error.
Some women were entitled to a 60% “married woman’s pension” when their husband retired – the amount those with low National Insurance contributions got under the old system.
These women were unlikely to have a full National Insurance record.
Since March 17, 2008, the uplift happened automatically.
But prior to that date, the married woman had to claim the uplift – even though she had already claimed her own state pension when she turned 60.
Thousands of women may not have realised that when their husband retired at 65, they had to make a second claim in order to get the uplift.
These husbands will now be over 80 years old, and their partners will have been missing out on valuable cash.
Most of these women were unaware they were supposed to claim the extra money.
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According to pensions expert Steve Webb, measures that were used to inform the women were “ineffective”, such as sending out leaflets but only when they were requested.
They also relied on men to pass the forms on to their wives.
Steve said “large numbers” of women have found out years later that they could have been on a higher pension and have only been able to backdate any increase by a year.
Daphne was one of those women and has now successfully taken a case against the DWP and won back more than the 12 months of backdating she was originally offered.
She lives in Woking, Surrey with her husband Tim, who is also 80, and the pair have two children and three grandchildren together.
Daphne and Tim’s last name has been changed.
Having worked as a bookkeeper during her career, Daphne reached state pension age in August 2003.
Because of gaps in her NI contributions, she received a modest pension of £38.66 per week, due to having an NI record of 42%.
Tim, who had worked in the computer industry, later reached retirement age in early 2008 and applied for his own state pension over the phone.
He was asked a series of questions and gave information for each, including about his wife’s situation and how much was on her record.
This is the point when Daphne would have become eligible for the 60% married woman’s pension, upping her own by 18 percentage points.
Tim was told that his wife wouldn’t need to sign any forms in order to get the boost and nothing was ever sent to Daphne.
Fast forward to 2020 and Daphne spotted coverage of married women’s pensions and thousands being underpaid.
She realised she could be on a higher rate and successfully applied for the uplift – getting an increase of £24 a week.
The catch was that this amount was only backdated by 12 months – so a boost of £1,248, despite having been retired for 17 years.
Daphne said: “When I first found out that I could have been on a higher pension for over a decade I was surprised and puzzled.
“Then when I claimed and was told it could only be backdated for one year, I felt it was unfair. It was their mistake, not mine.”
Daphne complained to the DWP over the fact that she has never been told she needed to submit another claim form and that if she had then she would’ve done so.
The complaint was initially thrown out by the DWP but the Independent Case Examiner (ICE) has now overruled the department.
It has ordered that the uplift be backdated to 2008, plus interest and compensation for “distress and inconvenience”.
The exact figure Daphne will receive will be different each year, due to pension rates increasing annually.
The Sun is not sharing the total amount won by Daphne.
Daphne added: “It has taken years to work our way through the complaints procedure, with the support of Steve Webb, but I’m absolutely delighted that my complaint has been upheld.
“My husband reads paperwork carefully and I would obviously have made a second claim for the higher state pension if anyone had actually told us that was how the system worked.
“I hope that those in positions of authority will look at what happened to me and accept that there are many other women in the same position and will put things right for all of them.”
Commenting on the outcome of the case, Steve Webb, partner at consultants LCP, said that these women now have a “glimmer of hope”.
He said: “The old processes for alerting women to the need to claim their state pension twice were hopelessly inadequate.
“We’ve had it suggested that women should have gone to the Job Centre to get an information booklet or have been told that they had to rely on their husbands ticking a box on a form.
“The scale of the problem shows that there was a systematic issue, and it seems to me highly likely that many women, like Daphne, were never sent the claim form that they needed.”
Steve added that he hopes this landmark case will lead to “many thousands more women getting justice”.
It’s important to note that just because Daphne has successfully won her claim, it doesn’t mean that other individual cases will have the same outcome.
However, this ruling does open up the potential for other women to claim compensation as well as the backdated pension payment.
Although there would need to be relative proof that they and their husband followed all the correct processes but were never sent the necessary claim form.
A DWP spokesperson told The Sun: “As upheld by a court last year, married women whose husbands reached state pension age after them, but before March 17 2008, are required by law to make a claim for an uplift to their State Pension.
“Our priority is ensuring pensioners receive the financial support to which they are entitled and the action we are taking now will correct historical underpayments made by successive governments.”
Are you being underpaid?
The full married woman’s rate this year is £93.60.
If your husband is on a full basic pension of £156.20, then you should be getting £93.60 in basic pension.
So, if you are not then you need to claim the uplift.
You can check if you are affected by using this handy tool on the LCP website.
How to seek a review
If you think might have been underpaid call The Pension Service (0800 731 7898) and ask for your state pension calculation to be reviewed.
If after this you are not satisfied that your payments are correct you can ask for a “mandatory reconsideration”, after which you will be told how to launch an appeal if you believe the calculations are still wrong.
If you are divorced and want to make sure that you are getting the right amount of state pension, you can find out more by reading this MoneyHelper guide.
Information on the rules for widows can be found on the government website.
The news comes after a huge update has been issued for thousands of women who took time off to raise children affected by state pension payment errors.
Plus, earlier this year tens of thousands of pensioners received a total of £300million after being previously underpaid.
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