Paid Voluntary NI contribution - Pension Forecast online has still not been updated?

Hi David Cain,

Your question is not relevant to income tax and will need to be directed to the National Insurance helpline:

National Insurance: general enquiries

Thank you.

I was £15.00 short on my 54 years of contributions, so I was informed that my pension would be approx £5.00 short of the full new sum of £179.60, I have since paid the missing £15.00, back in October, to ensure that when my pension payments start in December, I would receive the full entitlement, I called them today, 9th November, they informed me that it can take eight weeks for the back payment, to be updated to my pension account, if it takes what appears to be a long time for pension payments to be updated, is interest paid on the back dated amount once it is finally paid out, and if not paid when my pension starts in December? I know this is not a great deal, but something needs to be done in order to get things moving for all, I work with incoming payments for my company, and payments are updated daily, I understand that the payments coming into HMRC etc, would be great in volume, but there should be a process to post identifiable payments straight away, I understand that there would be staff shortage issues following Covid though, but interested to see what is being done to clear the backlog of pensions being held up etc?

I made a payment to cover 2019-20 in my wife’s NI contributions on October 7. The payment has still not been credited. Is this delay normal.

Hi, we are in similar situation; my wife paid for two years voluntary class 1 NI contributions by cheque. Cheque was cashed on 7/12/21, however, on checking her Pension forecast online the extra two years NI credits have not been added to her records. I am a bit worried as cheque & application was sent in a month ago so would have hoped her NI record/pension forecast would have been updated by now.

Admin 19 (nearly a month ago) - Helpline now saying up 16 weeks delay, I paid 8 October. (early October) Is your statement still accurate?

Hi,

Unfortunately the team we have working on these cases has very limited resources and have many other duties to perform.

The clearance of the payments has not been expedited as quickly as we would have liked. The team are currently working on payments received on the 4 October.

If you call the helpline and speak to an advisor, they would be able to allocate the payment for you. 

National Insurance: general enquiries

Thank you.

I’m puzzled why HMRC 19 stated over a month ago that they were working on payments made at the beginning of October 2020 and 3 days ago they had only reached 4th October. This doesn’t inspire much confidence that the backlog will be cleared any time soon.

On 16 Nov 2021 I transferred nearly £4,000 to HMRC to top up my wife’s NI Contributions record from 30 years to 35 years. I used the 18 digit reference they provided to enable them to credit this payment to my wife’s account. Despite numerous phone calls to HMRC they have still not credited this sum to her account. My wife has now reached state pension retirement age and has received her first payment which is incorrectly based on 30 qualifying years. This is causing my wife and me considerable stress - £4,000 is a lot of money and yet it seems to have been “lost” within HMRC somewhere. Does anyone know how long the backlog is at present? We have been waiting almost 10 weeks so far. A comment from HRMC would be appreciated.

I've just made an online payment to top up my NI contributions to maximise my state pension. I realise this may take some time to show up in the system. If I claim my pension now will I receive a back-dated payment and full pension once the additional contribution has been processed. Thanks.

Hi Jeff 24,

There has been a delay in updating records with voluntary contributions however payments made in November should have been processed by now.  

There are circumstances where paying years prior to 2016 will not add to a State Pension award. You would need to confirm that you spoke to DWP before making the payment and that they confirmed the additional years would increase the State Pension award for your wife. 

If that was the case and the funds were paid to the correct HMRC account [083220 12001004] and your wife’s account has not been updated then you will need to contact us so we can begin a payment trace via our banking team.  

When the payment is traced and posted then the payment date will be honoured and your wife's pension will be updated retrospectively to the higher rate so she will not lose out financially.

National Insurance: general enquiries

Thank you.
 

Hi Michael Smithson,

If the payment was made before you reached State Pension age, then yes DWP should provide a back dated payment.

However if this payment was made after you reached State Penson age then the uplift in pension would only be backdated to the date you made the payment.

Thank you

Hello, I have been given permission to pay voluntary Class 2 NICs. As this is a number of years (and there are some years where I do not need them as Class 3 NICs have been paid in full), I would like to specify the tax year, paying each individually via internet banking, for example stating clearly my NI number and the year - say 2006-7. I do not just want to pay them all in a lump sum as the years required will not be specified and if I write to HMRC, it takes forever to get a reply and sometimes then I have to write back again! Also, may I ask please, what is the current time to process Class 2 NICs from payment? Thank you very much for your help!

Following my post a couple of weeks ago, my wife’s NI Contributions record has now been updated with the additional 5 years. This took another phone call to HMRC who sorted it out in 5 minutes. In all the delay was 11 weeks.

Hi
 

EFJ61,

You would need to discuss this further with our National Insurance team: Pay Class 2 National Insurance if you do not pay through Self Assessment   and : National Insurance: general enquiries  . Thank you.

Hello. I am a customer from abroad and I made a Class 3 voluntary NIC’s contribution on 4th of October 2021. My NI Contributions record has now been updated after nearly 18 weeks. Does anybody know how long does it take for my contribution to show up online?

Hi, Is it once again possible to send cheques for voluntary NI contributions, now that civil servants are returning to their offices post Covid? Existing advice says that this option is suspended during the pandemic. Sending a cheque with covering letter is a more convenient way for me to pay than online, as the online system does not allow you to specify which years a payment is to cover. Thank you.

Hi
 

Farshad M,

You may wish to speak to the national insurance helpline regarding this : National Insurance: general enquiries    .

Thank you.

Hi, any idea what the current backlog is? We sent a form and a cheque, to pay class 3 nics for my wife, over 3 weeks ago. The cheque hasn't been cashed yet. Thanks Ed

Hi Ed48,

We currently are not accepting cheque payments.

More on this can be found here:

Pay voluntary Class 3 National Insurance

Other methods can be found here:

Overview

Thank you.

Hello HMRC Admin 19, Please can you answer the other part of Ed48's query ... what is the current backlog ? Specifically, I would like to know when my "Voluntary Class 3 for 2019/2020" payment which was paid by bank transfer on 13/1/2022 should be credited ?