Pension credit only £3 less than State Pension

[SpanishBaguette]

Maybe it's been obvious to others but I've only just found out that Pension Credit will top you up to no less than £227 per week which is only £3 less than the state pension.

AIBU to be hacked off that I need to pay 35 years of contributions to end up with a near identical pension to someone who gets it for free. WTF?

How do you determine ‘who contributed’?

Surely pension credit was originally created to cover the difference between people who retired before 2016 on the "old" state pension which was less generous than its replacement?

My late mum worked as a carer in a mental health team part-time until she was 78 thanks to a shabby 1970s divorce settlement and fairly low paid work (she was a nurse). With pension credit, and the council tax discount, warm home uplift, free TV license etc, she got by until she was 89. It was a modest liofe, but she didn't go cold or hungry.

I’m sorry, but tough. At 67 people are perfectly able to move house. I am not OK paying benefits so that people can live exactly where they choose and pass the house down to their children. At the very least a debt should be put against the house so that the money is repaid after they die.

It's also a gateway benefit to other things such as higher winter fuel payment - pension credit.

God, it's all gone a bit Ayn Rand on here.

The UK wouldn't look great if our streets were full of homeless and starving pensioners who could no longer access Pension Credit. I would imagine that a lot of them would be women.

She wont have got them if her husband claimed them. It was a common trap that women had little say in.

If you’ve worked for 35 years you will have had a better life than the majority who live their lives on benefits and if you’ve been sensible you will have saved, kept out of debt and paid into a pension

Like lots of things nowadays - there should be a gulf of difference in lifestyle between people that work and those that choose not to...but there isn't. There should be a gulf in the lifestyle of someone retired that has worked all of their life and someone that hasn't.

So you want then to sell their house to buy another house, What are you talking about ?

I thought you could still claim pension credit even if you did have a private pension.

Receipt is based on your income being below the income threshold not if you have a private pension??

My friend cashed in her private pension as soon as she could. She spent it all. Every penny. On luxury 5 star holidays to Dubai, the Maldives and Australia. Bought designer handbags and lots of new stuff for her home. She didn’t save a penny for retirement as she knew she would get pension credit and would be better off than if she had a small private pension. She now gets pension credit, her rent paid and other benefits.

It’s not something I would do but I can see why those struggling on a state pension with a small private pension feel cheated.

Gulf my god !

I want them to downsize to free up equity, or to sell up and move into rented. Whatever they prefer, but I don’t think equity in a house should be disregarded.

I love this idea that people can just rock up at the Benefits Agency and say "I don't feel like working, give me money."

Its a pretty onerous process claiming benefits and the sanctions regime is severe.

don’t then.
its that simple, if it’s that easy to just not work and sit around doing nothing….just do that.
personally i’d rather be at work in the career that I worked really for and loved doing, but instead I’m at home, missing a leg, on 19
different mUedications a day, feeling like death from chemo. 🤷🏼‍♀️

You can but there will be a threshold,

So imagine you can't claim PC because of the property you own which is worth £150k. It needs work doing on it and isn't selling. What do you live off in the meantime? Or are you another poster who thinks we should be starving pensioners?

The system isn't perfect but I would rather live in a society that ensures a basic level of income rather than a punitive system where the poorest die.

You think you have it all worked out but you are just making a show of yourself and spouting soundbites!

Houses can always be sold at the right price. Any they would have years of warning to prepare.

Would you care to tell me why you think it’s right for people to be able to hold onto assets while getting benefits? Or do you just want to keep on with the insults?

Ah move into rented! Yes and we all know how there is so much available affordable rented property around. And guess what, once the equity runs out, someone getting PC will get help with rented (whilst their equity has lined the pockets of a landlord).

Do you think recipients of PC never worked? Someone could be just short of required contributions.
Some companies had an opt out scheme. They could have been ill or self employed for a while. They could even have been carers, without knowing the system.
They could have been their husband's book keeper and he wasn't paying it.

It's the old trope of "people who'd sat on their backsides gambling and smoking while I worked my socks off!" Not necessarily true.

During Covid, many people believed they were risking their lives to provide essential services while others stayed at home on full pay.

Some people seem woefully misinformed- pension credit is more akin to universal credit - TOO UP benefit rather than “if you sat on your arse deliberately all your life (whoever such people avoiding job coaches and benefits cuts are) you get a pension@.

people who do qualify for state pension who would qualify for less than the “full” amount of state pension can qualify for pension credit but it is a MEANS-TESTED benefit.

Can people stop being Farage-cum-Trump spreading misinformation about a particular benefit that you could just “google”!

A 10k pension pot is about £8 per week.

You do realise that those people will include those who have been ill or disabled and unable to work or do you think they are lazy feckless people as well? Our state pension is one of the lowest in Europe. I don’t know anyone who could live on less than £227 a week indefinitely to cover everything. Pensioners used to die of cold in the winter as they couldn’t afford their heating bill or nourishing food. I remember reading about it when I was young and women were particularly badly affected as they were in lower paid jobs. So that is why governments made it necessary to have a private pension and give top ups to those who have had one. Count yourself lucky you have one, lots of older people don’t. I hope you have a very comfortable retirement.