Rob-dogs!!

Have you seen this business about NI contributions and pension entitlement? At present, you only get a full old-age pension if you have at least 44 years (39 for women) of contributions. If you are coming up to retirement age, and have fewer years than this, the Government will write to you, pointing this out and advising you of the facility for making top-up payments to increase your number of contributions. They have been doing this for years. Now they have stated their intention to bring in legislation to require only 30 years of contributions for a full pension. So where does this leave all those people who had 30 years or more, but have been making voluntary extra payments to bring them up to the old limits for a full pension? The answer seems to be - with egg on their faces! Revenue & Customs have said there will be no question of a refund - they say these letters were not "advising people to make top-up payments, but merely telling them about the consequences if they don't". What a scam!