The Government has introduced a temporary window where you can fill gaps on your national insurance record dating back 16 years, rather than the usual 6. The deadline is just around the corner, on 5th April 2023.
The Temporary Window
Ordinarily, we can fill in gaps on our national insurance record up to a maximum of 6 years after the gap occurred. After these 6 years have elapsed you cannot make any changes and it instead becomes a permanent gap on your national insurance record.
At least, that was the case. However, we have now been granted a temporary window wherein we can fill in gaps dating back an additional 10 years. Where before, for the tax year 2022-23, the oldest year we could fill in gaps for was 2016-17, we are now allowed to fill gaps dating back to 2006-07 for a limited period.
This temporary window is only applied to those who fall under the new state pension system, i.e, those reaching state pension age after 5th April 2016.
Maximising your State Pension
You usually need a minimum of 10 qualifying years on your national insurance record to claim the state pension. A qualifying year is when you were:
- Working and paying national insurance
- Getting national insurance credits, e.g, if you were unemployed, sick, a carer or a parent
- You were paying voluntary national insurance contributions
To qualify for the maximum amount of state pension, you need 35 years of qualifying national insurance contributions.
Inflation-Linked Savings
It’s important to remember here that the state pension is triple locked, meaning it is linked to match the highest figure out of 3 separate measures of inflation:
- Average earnings
- Consumer Prices Index
- 2.5%
Therefore, filling these gaps on your national insurance record enables you to make the most of an inflation-linked retirement income. This window is offering a great opportunity and is certainly worth looking into, because once the deadline is up, you’re back to only being able to fill in gaps dating back 6 years.
Checking your State Pension and National Insurance Record
You can check your national insurance record by clicking here. This will allow you to see if there are any gaps and the amount required to fill these in.
You can also check your state pension forecast if you want to find out how much state pension you’re eligible to claim, and when you can start receiving payments.