Pension deadlines

[ThisWildPoet]

I watched the Martin Lewis thing last night about pension deadlines, but I clearly wasnt paying enough attention..
Ive logged into my pension and NI contributions thing.
I have full year for every year bar 2,
1999 to 2000

1998 to 1999

It says

Your forecast is £221.20 a week, £961.83 a month, £11,541.90 a year

Does that mean that I dont need to worry about those 2 years?
Im 47 so have another 20 and a bit years of work ahead of me too.

Ta

Yes, I wouldn’t worry too much in your position. I think you currently need to pay in 36 yrs NI to qualify for a full state pension so you’ve plenty of time to carry on working and complete your NI record.

However, these things change as my husband retired about 6 years ago and only needed 30yrs of contributions (although he’d worked and paid in about 40+ yrs).

It might be a good idea to talk to a financial adviser to look at your potential income in retirement and how you can maximise this whilst you’re still working. Obviously, if living on the state pension alone, it will be tight.

I have a work pension, but its very basic. We've spent the last 20 years plowing any spare cash into becoming mortgage free alongside raising a family.
I think we need to start forward planning.

You can only top up years from 2006 onwards, so your gaps can't be filled even if you wanted to.

It will tell you how many years you still need to accrue to get your full state pension. As long as you’re sure you will definitely get these in before state pension age (either from working or getting NI credits e.g. from claiming child benefit) then you’re fine and no need to buy back missing years.

You need 35 years total to get full state pension. So the £221.20 forecast is based on you achieving that, but you won't have done so yet. At 47 you have plenty of time to cover any shortfall if you continue to work.

I just had a read through and saw that. I just hadn't managed to make it make sense in my head.

How many years will you have by the time you retire? If the years you will continue to pay get you to around 40 years(not sure I would want to rely on it staying at 35), you wouldn't need to pay earlier gaps.