Fehnert Financial Services Ltd can guide you through planning for your retirement, so that when the time comes, you can make the most of your savings.

What exactly is a State Pension?

The State Pension is made up of basic State Pension and additional State Pension. If you have built up enough qualifying years during your working life, you will receive the full basic State Pension when you reach State Pension age. Qualifying years are the years in which you have been paying or treated as paying National Insurance contributions.

In certain circumstances, you can be credited with National Insurance contributions if you have been unable to do paid work. You can get a number of different types of National Insurance credits.

How many qualifying years do I need?

Men need 44 qualifying years by the age of 65 to get a full basic State Pension and women who reach the age of 60 before 2010 need 39 qualifying years.

If you do not have the full number of qualifying years, you may still get a percentage of the full basic State Pension depending on the number of qualifying years you have.

To get the minimum basic State Pension (25%) you normally need 10 or 11 qualifying years. If you are more than four months away from State Pension age, you can find out how much you will get by requesting a State Pension Forecast

The Pensions Act 2007 has reduced the number of qualifying years needed for a full basic State Pension to 30 for people who reach State Pension age on or after 6 April 2010.

Lost touch with an old pension?

If you have a pension that you have lost touch with or are unsure of its value we able able to assist with this, alternatively, please follow the link below for The Pension Tracing Service. This will enable you to ask for a pension trace for yourself or someone you know.  You can even track down someone elses old pension if you think you may be a beneficiary.  All you need is the name of the pension scheme, or the employer the scheme is with.

www.thepensionservice.gov.uk/tracing  or ring 0845 6002537 for The Pension Service.

or You may apply for a State Pension forecast from the Department of Work and Pensions online here

If you would like to talk to us more about this or would like us to assist you with tracing your pension, or any other matter regarding any aspect of planning for your retirement, please contact our pensions team here.