What happens to your UK state pension if you move to OZ? Not that it will be much by the time I retire, but I am Scottish after all!! Look after the pennies and all that!!!

it gets paid at retirement, but i think you have to continue to pay a stamp to get full pension

Can you still claim it in Oz? How do you go about paying the stamp?

yes. you have to contact the pension folks to sort it. if you do a search on uk pensions within the forum there is a link to the correct info

You have to have been paying in for a certain minimum time - you can contribute to Gordon Brown volutarily from Oz if you think it worthwhile.

The big thing is that the state pension will be frozen - ie., not indexed - if you come to live in Oz, or Canada, or South Africa etc. If you live in the USA, Philippines, EU, and a host of other countries then it will be indexed as if you are in the UK.

Don't ask: it is a national disgrace and has been fought by several groups for years against various hues of government. The whole thing I believe is going to the EU Commisssion for Human Rights but don't hold your breath.

All sorts of specious arguments have been advanced over the years to justify this blatant discrimination, and as each is shown to be fatuous another is dreamed up.

The current one is that it would be "too expensive" to index the pensions and would cost £400m. I note that the UK is currently overpaying - due to fraud and incompetence - £4Bn over two years in benefits.....

In any case, since when did it become a rational argument to say that something which has been paid for essentially by contract over the years can remain unpaid "because it is too expensive"? Stop paying *all* state pensions then - think how much *that* would save!

It will also be the case that some of any private pension might also be frozen if it fell into the "opted out" SERPS provisions - and that can be even more financially bruising.

(PS - If you are an MP, a Judge or a Civil Servant ignore that last bit - they are exempt, by a treasury trick).

Sorry to bang on, but you *did* ask!

I/we are none of the above and the waste that you mention is one of the many reasons that we feel we should get out of the UK- there's nothing left in this country for our children except working till you're 80 and getting less than someone who has hijacked a plane!!
PS sorry for the politics!

Don't expect it to be better here though! The dependency culture is even more ingrained in Australia than the UK with I believe even fewer taxpayers for each benefit recipient.

The "stick up for the underdog" Aussie ethos is all too often an excuse to push money at those who have learned how to milk the system. There is a huge underclass of people who wouldn't recognise the word "work" but can add up their benefit entitlements quicker than a Cray can!

Contact your employers National Insurance Office and request them to send you the forms to pay Class 3 Voluntery Contributions. We have been paying them for the last 8 years as our pension would be too much to lose. This is done by Direct Debit from our UK bank account. Don't forget your pension will be frozen from he date that you receive it though.

Have you also thought about when you receive your P45 and complete the forns to become non resident, you can claim the tax back which you paid in the current tax year.

Maggie

One comment - you have to have paid full contributions for 26 years to qualify for a full pension. There are a number of years which can be credited to women who have not worked during a period of time due to raising a family.

I think the current monthly class 3 contributions are £30 - 36 depending how many weeks in the month. Depending how many years you would have to continue paying before you are entitled to your pension you would have to decide whether it will be worth it.

I will be entitled to my pension at 60. However due to that stupid woman who wanted to work until she was 65, many women will not be able to receive their pension for another 5 years until they are 65.

If you go onto the pensions website and enter your date of birth it will tell you at what age you will be entitled to receiveyou pension.

Maggie

Hi the current contribution rate is 44 years to get a full uk state pension not 26! But in the new white paper about pensions they are looking at dropping that to 30, to help people who have taken timeout for family or caring reasons.

Hope this helps

Leo

Maggie

Your post on claiming back tax paid in previous year caught my eye. We are moving to Australia later this year.

Does this apply to everyone? This would be a good sum to help us on our way if it was.

Tell me more.





Carol xxx

Well put, Rog - thieving government b******s !

Jim

Hi ray2gill

I see in your post you mention that all the tax can be claimed back, you mean you actually get it all back.. And if you do how long does it take ?? thanks for your help,

Simon

I've got no idea about pensions as I was a late starter and didn't start paying into a work's one ( nursing ) until 2 years ago!! I'm 35!!!!
So, what do I do about that when and if I get into Oz? As I have no idea about these things can anyone explain what I should do?? ( explain it like your talking to a 2 year old,please ) ;o)

*pearly*

(The following should not be taken as expert advice!)

I think the year you take up tax residence is treated as a special case in each country. (It's complicated since the tax year starts on April 6th in the UK and July 1st here - why oh why can't every place use 1st January???)

In my own case I got exemption from paying UK tax wef my leaving date - my pension office then took it upon themselves to refund not only that month's tax but all the tax I'd paid that financial year! So come UK tax return time, when I did the final year's return, I had to pay back a rather big number of ££ to Gordon. After that my pension was not taxed in the UK.

Similarly, I began paying Oz tax wef my arrival date, in arrears since the first tax return wasn't made until after 1st July.

In each case the part-in part-out portions are treated slightly differently but it's not complicated.

The best thing is that the Australian online tax return is really straightforward: it works - unlike my experience with the Inland Revenue's etax, which I never got to work!