Your MoneyQ&A

State pension: locked out by changes in the rules

Social insurance in other countries may deliver pension to victim of government tinkering with State pension age and PRSI rules

A man locked out of the State pension by a series of changes to the rules may qualify if he has worked elsewhere in the EU or some other countries. Photograph: iStock
A man locked out of the State pension by a series of changes to the rules may qualify if he has worked elsewhere in the EU or some other countries. Photograph: iStock
Dominic Coyle's picture
Dominic Coyle
Tue Feb 18 2025 - 05:00

I started paying full rate PRSI contributions from 2013 as a self-employed person when I was 56 years old.

With the old rule, which set the pension age to be 67 in 2021, I would have been entitled to State pension in 2023. However, under the new ruling, I was deprived of paying PRSI in 2022 which would have completed the 520 PRSI contributions and entitled me to State pension when I became 67 in November 2023.

I have also been denied the option of deferring, ie extending PRSI contribution until the age of 70 to make up for the one year in question and qualify for State pension. That is simply because I was born before January 1st, 1958. I have been disadvantaged and discriminated against by this new ruling. Is there any hope for me?

Mr S.T.

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You do seem to have fallen between all stools.

As you say, there has been a lot of chopping and changing to the rules on when people are eligible for the State pension and, more recently, greater flexibility in meeting the eligibility requirements.

When you started contributing back in 2013, the law said retirement age would rise to 67 by 2021.

Of course, the government backtracked with alacrity after pensions became a doorstep issue in the 2020 election. As a result, the State pension age has stayed at 66, and that, as of now, is the plan for the future.

That leaves you one year shy of qualifying for any State pension.

More recent rules allowing people to defer drawing down their pension for up to four years – largely to allow them meet the eligibility requirements – also exclude you as they apply only to people born after January 1st, 1958.

But, by the time that was announced in late 2023, you had already hit the State pension age and therefore were no longer paying PRSI. And, as you were born before 1958, you could not make up the lost ground.

[ Can I get a State pension if I only start work here in my late 50s? ]

To further confuse matters, public servants have been allowed to work to the age of 70 since 2018. That puts you at a disadvantage to another person in identical circumstances who worked as a public servant.

You could try appealing to the Department of Social Protection on the basis of your circumstances and the repeated changes to Irish pensions policy and PRSI over the past decade though I’m sceptical that it will lead to any change in position.

The alternative is to see if you can use social insurance payments from another country to boost your Irish record and get you over that qualification line.

Ireland has agreements with all other European Union states that specifically provide for the combining of social insurance records across national boundaries to avail of welfare payments as long as you are a national of one of the states, have legal residence or refugee status.

They also have agreements on this issue with the UK, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea.

Please send your queries to Dominic Coyle, Q&A, The Irish Times, 24-28 Tara Street Dublin 2, or by email to dominic.coyle@irishtimes.com with a contact phone number. This column is a reader service and is not intended to replace professional advice

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