Since 2021, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has identified 130,948 pensioners who had been underpaid their state pension due to a fault in the system.
These pensioners received substantial back payments, averaging as much as £11,725 in some cases.
The Government is expected to pay out over £1bn in state pension arrears due to longstanding errors, according to new figures from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
Since launching a correction exercise in January 2021, the DWP has identified more than £800million in underpaid state pensions.
An update published on Thursday revealed that, as of March 31, 2025, 130,948 cases had been reviewed, uncovering £804.7m owed to pensioners.
The Government is expected to pay out over £1bn in state pension arrears due to longstanding errors
GETTYThose affected by the errors include married women who didn’t receive a pension increase when their husband retired, individuals whose pensions weren’t reassessed after their spouse died, and over-80s who missed out on automatic entitlement boosts.
The DWP noted that some claims may fall into multiple categories, as cases can be checked for more than one type of error.
Three main categories of women affected by state pension errors:
- Married women (Category BL) – whose pensions were not automatically increased when their husbands retired.
- Widowed women – whose pensions were not reassessed after their partner’s death.
- Women over 80 (Category D) – who did not receive the automatic uplift they were entitled to.
On average, married women affected by the error have received £5,553 in back payments. Widowed women received the highest arrears, with an average payout of £11,725. Meanwhile, women over 80 were paid an average of £2,203 in missed state pension entitlements.
Married women (Category BL)
- Cases reviewed: 321,439
- Underpayments identified: 47,004
- Average arrears payment: £5,553
- Total repaid: £252.8 million
A second correction exercise, launched in January 2024, is now underway to fix errors related to missing Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP)
GETTYWidowed women
- Cases reviewed: 465,316
- Underpayments identified: 50,261
- Average arrears payment: £11,725
- Total repaid: £483.4 million
Women over 80 (Category D)
- Cases reviewed: 90,753
- Underpayments identified: 33,683
- Average arrears payment: £2,203
- Total repaid: £68.5 million
By September 2024, HMRC had sent out more than 370,000 letters to people who might have missed out.
Over 42,000 HRP applications were processed, and around 19,000 were passed to the DWP to reassess pension entitlements. Of these, the DWP had reviewed 11,700 cases, uncovering arrears in over 5,000 instances.
So far, the second HRP correction has paid out £42m in back payments, with an average payout of £7,859 per person.
When combined with the main state pension correction exercise (which began in 2021), total repayments had reached £846m by the end of September 2024.
Historic "errors" has resulted in women being underpaid the state pension GETTY In addition, an earlier HRP correction dating back to 2008, which former pensions minister Steve Webb prompted, resulted in £83 million in arrears being paid to 36,000 people.
Altogether, around 171,000 people—mostly women—have been underpaid, and £929m in back payments has now been made.
With the current HRP review still ramping up, experts expect the total amount repaid to exceed £1bn in the coming year.
Commenting, Steve Webb, LCP partner who played a key role in unearthing these errors said: "We have become so used to stories about state pension errors that it is easy to become dulled to the scale of what went wrong.
"It now looks as though the total amount underpaid will pass through the £1bn mark this year with over 170,000 people having lost out.
"The vast majority of those who lost were women, some of whom were underpaid for decades or even went to their grave never paid the right state pension.
"The remaining corrections need to be handled as a matter of urgency. This should never be allowed to happen again."
