Thousands waiting SIX months for state pension
ALMOST 5,000 pensioners have not received their first state pension payments six months after they applied, figures show.
Despite an October deadline for backlogged claims to be cleared, 4,900 newly retired people are still languishing in the pensions queue.
Steve Webb, partner at LCP and former pensions minister, lamented the delays, saying: “It’s clear the problem of late payment of state pensions is not resolved as ministers promised.
“If people put off claiming their pension but now want to receive it, they should get their money promptly.
“The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) should not just dismiss the fact that nearly 5,000 are still waiting to get the money they are due.”
Most delayed pensions for people who have just turned 66 are now being paid following a catch-up exercise by the DWP.
Staff shortages and the pandemic were blamed for the backlog built up over the summer. While an accurate number of pensioners hit by the problem has not been published, it is thought to be in the low thousands.
One charity said that the problem could have a particularly harmful impact on poorer claimants.
“For people who rely on the state pension as a relatively high proportion of their income it could be a bit of a disaster,” said David Sinclair, director at the International Longevity Centre UK.
“The potential for anxiety and stress is huge.”
Pensions minister Guy Opperman told MPs earlier this year that hundreds of department staff were being redeployed to deal with the backlog in state pension payments.
He told them to reassure their older constituents that the system would be back to normal by the end of October.
Now, the DWP has said that there are still 4,900 outstanding pension claims which had forced officials to contact customers – noting that in some cases, more information will be required before processing can be completed.
“We are sorry that some new customers have faced delays receiving their state pension,” said a DWP spokesman.
“We have now issued all outstanding payments and are in contact with those customers where more information is required in order to complete processing.”
The DWP is already facing criticism, and a heavy workload, after it emerged that an estimated 200,000 female pensioners are collectively owed up to £2.7billion after the under-payment of state pensions, owing to historic errors at the department.