UK National Insurance Contributions

[Famous5]

I have received a pension forecast from the government which states that I have paid 30 years of NI contributions and will therefore qualify for a full pension at 65 (in 6 years time)

Can I now stop paying NI contributions from my company pension and from the part time seasonal job which I now have.

If so, how do I go about informing them?

[R1Geezer]

what would you think?

[Rollo]

If you earn money from employment and it is above the threshhold for paying NI then you still have to pay it.

I don't understand your comment about paying NI on your company pension. Such pension payments are not liable to NI deductions.

If you are paying the flat rate voluntary NI contributions then you can stop those now as you already wqualify for the full basic state pension when you reach age 65.

[Sasha-2008]

For any wages you earn in any job you must pay NI.

the only one you can stop is if you have a private pension, although I would not recommend stopping it as it will result in your pension payments being lower when you do retire.

Normally when you pay a private pension it makes your NI payments a bit lower.

hope this helps.

[buildersmate]

I'm not sure that some of the above is right. The way I think it works is:

If you are working, you can't avoid paying NI.
If you are not working, you will get credited with NI qualification years between age 60 and 65 - to count towards your basic State Pension 30 qualifying years (I appreciate this doen't help you).
If you are in a Contracted-out company pension scheme, you aren't paying into the state scheme. However you also aren't adding anything to your state entitlement (which will still exist for those years when you weren't in the company scheme).
If you are either in a contracted-in or a private pension scheme, you can't avoiding paying the reduced NI bit - even though it isn't helping your basic State benefit entitlement.
Swings and roundabouts, I'm afraid.

[dasherman]

'If you are in a Contracted-out company pension scheme, you aren't paying into the state scheme.'

The above statement by buildersmate is wrong. Everybody pays into the basic state pension by paying NI contributions or being on certain state benefits. If you contract out you don't pay into the 2nd state pension - also known as S2P or SERPS.

A company/personal/stakeholder pension is in addition to the basic state pension.

[buildersmate]

Thanks for the correction Dasherman - that does now make sense.