There may be gaps in your national insurance contributions due to various circumstances.
Career breaks and time out to care for children are common reasons, and women are therefore more likely to have gaps than men.
Under current rules 35 qualifying years of NI contributions are required to get the maximum amount on retirement.
The Government have launched an online tool which makes it easy to both check and pay any additional contributions to make up for those shortfalls. The service is called “Check your State Pension” and can be accessed via GOV.UK or on the HMRC app.
The forecast details your NI record by tax year and identifies if there are any years that are not counting towards your State Pension entitlement. The service also shows the details of any voluntary NI contributions that you could make to increase your forecast.
The service allows you to choose which years you would like to pay voluntary contributions for and then takes you through to a secure payment facility to make payment.
If you think you may have gap years in your contributions, it is important to check sooner rather than later. Because of new State Pension transitional arrangements, the deadline for paying voluntary NI contributions was extended to 5 April 2025.
Currently, it is possible to make voluntary contributions for tax years going back to 6 April 2006. However, from 6 April 2025, it will only be possible to make voluntary contributions for the preceding six years.
This is important, so please contact us if you need any help or advice.
