Pensions - HMRC/DWP

[Socio South West]

Wondering if anyone on the forum can give any advice to help one of my clients...

My client is a recently retired woman over State Pension age. Shortly before her State Pension kicked in her accountant advised that there was a slight shortfall in her necessary NI contributions to receive the full State Pension.
She was advised that by paying the shortfall in NI contributions as a lump sum her pension would be at the full rate. After doing the sums it was apparently a no brainer, and she made the payment to HMRC.

That was over two years ago,

She has still not had her pension made up to the full rate. Her accountant has contacted HMRC and DWP and advises there is no reason that her pension should not be made up. She herself has had three or four prolonged telephone conversations with the DWP who say they can see the payment has been made and she should be receiving full pension, but still nothing has been forthcoming. Anything that has passed in writing says she is receiving pension at the correct rate for her NI contributions (ie reduced rate)
The arrears are accumulating, and now well into four figures.
She has also requested a repayment of the payment to HMRC, but she is told that is not now possible.

Has anyone else experienced anything similar, or can anyone suggest a third party who can get DWP to pull their finger out and sort this?

 

[Newchodge]

Wondering if anyone on the forum can give any advice to help one of my clients...

My client is a recently retired woman over State Pension age. Shortly before her State Pension kicked in her accountant advised that there was a slight shortfall in her necessary NI contributions to receive the full State Pension.
She was advised that by paying the shortfall in NI contributions as a lump sum her pension would be at the full rate. After doing the sums it was apparently a no brainer, and she made the payment to HMRC.

That was over two years ago,

She has still not had her pension made up to the full rate. Her accountant has contacted HMRC and DWP and advises there is no reason that her pension should not be made up. She herself has had three or four prolonged telephone conversations with the DWP who say they can see the payment has been made and she should be receiving full pension, but still nothing has been forthcoming. Anything that has passed in writing says she is receiving pension at the correct rate for her NI contributions (ie reduced rate)
The arrears are accumulating, and now well into four figures.
She has also requested a repayment of the payment to HMRC, but she is told that is not now possible.

Has anyone else experienced anything similar, or can anyone suggest a third party who can get DWP to pull their finger out and sort this?

Try this

Complaints procedure

How to complain about the service you get from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) or from an organisation that provides its services.

www.gov.uk

 

[Socio South West]

Many thanks @Newchodge - That looks like the perfect information

 

[Socio South West]

The saga continues!

The link provided gives a step by step guide to registering a complaint... Step 3 is where my client is at now, and she spent well over an hour in two phone calls to DWP yesterday to try and get the complaint elevated to a Senior Manager.

Both the people she spoke with twisted and turned to try and evade the elevation, blaming her accountant on the one hand for not following correct procedures and blaming her on the other hand for not contacting them direct when DWP have a signed notification that my client's accountants are her agent.
From the conversation it is clear that all written communications are on file and available to DWP.

However, as a consequence of this thread I received direct contact from a financial journalist from one of the heavyweight daily newspapers who is looking at this and asking if I would put them in touch with my client.

Back to the calls.... My client mentioned that there was press interest in the matter to the second DWP operator she spoke to, and the Elevation was extremely quickly achieved, although the timescale for response is 28 working days.


Watch this space....

 

[Newchodge]

Thanks for the update.

 

[KeithGreen]

The response by DWP to the press interest is noteworthy. I've considered contacting the press about a longstanding issue I have with HMRC - might be worth considering further.