Voluntary Class 3 NI Contributions - How long for a reply

Hi HMRC Team, I live in Japan and sent the Application to pay voluntary class national insurance contributions in August but am yet to hear anything. I understand you must be very busy but is this normal? Just want to know if I should follow up or just be patient. Many thanks for your assistance! Dean

Hi dbevan Bevan,
Sorry for the delay in processing your application to pay voluntary National Insurance contributions whilst overseas.  
Our Team that deal with this are dealing with queries received on 7 February 2023 at the moment.  
So you could expect a reply after 46 weeks from the date that we received your application.
Thank you.