Eligible pensioners can get an extra dose of cash every month to boost their State Pension.
The DWP pays an ‘over 80 pension’ to eligible retirees aged 80 and over (Image: Getty)
Older state pensioners can boost their State Pension by £422.80 per month with a single claim to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Pensioners aged 80 or over who get a basic State Pension of less than £105.70 per week, or get no basic State Pension at all, may be eligible to claim an ‘over 80 pension‘ from the DWP to boost their monthly payments. You’ll get the basic State Pension if you’re a man born before April 6, 1951, or a woman born before April 6, 1953, and it is currently worth £176.45 per week if you get the full amount.
Over a full year, this amounts to a maximum of £9,145.40 annually in pension payments. But to get the full amount, men born between 1945 and 1951 usually need 30 qualifying years of National Insurance (NI), or 44 qualifying years if they were born between 1945 and 1951. Women, by comparison, usually need 30 qualifying years if you were born between 1950 and 1953, or 39 qualifying years if you were born before 1950.
So if your basic State Pension is less than £176.45 per week, or you don’t get any payments at all, then you could boost your income by claiming the DWP‘s over 80 pension.
The over-80 pension is not a separate weekly payment, but rather a top-up to your existing basic State Pension, which is usually paid every four weeks.
As the over-80 pension is paid at the same frequency as the basic State Pension, which is every four weeks, it means older pensioners can get up to £422.80 extra per month from the DWP to boost their pension pot.
If you’re eligible for the over-80 pension, the amount you’ll get depends on how much basic State Pension you get (if any), but if it’s less than £105.70 per week, you could get the difference paid up to this amount.
The DWP says an 80-year-old who gets £43 per week basic State Pension, for example, would get an extra £62.70 to top up their weekly amount to £105.70, which would amount to around £422.80 per month, or £5,496.40 extra per year in your pension pot.
This pension is only available to people aged 80 or over and you can’t claim it if you reached State Pension age – which is currently 66 years old for both men and women – on or after April 6, 2016.
You must have been a UK resident for at least 10 years out of a 20-year period, which must include the day before you turned 80 or any day after, or you were ‘ordinarily resident’ in the UK, the Isle of Man or Gibraltar on your 80th birthday, or the date you submitted your claim for the over-80 pension. The earliest you can claim is three months before your 80th birthday.
The DWP said: “The over-80 pension is a State Pension for people aged 80 or over. To be eligible, you must get either a basic State Pension of less than £105.70 a week, or no basic State Pension at all.
“It can give you £105.70 a week in the 2025 to 2026 tax year. What you get depends on how much basic State Pension you get, if any. If you do not get the basic State Pension or you get less than £105.70 a week, you could get the difference paid up to this amount. You cannot get the over 80 pension if you reached State Pension age on or after 6 April 2016.”
Unlike the basic and new State Pension schemes, your eligibility for the over-80 pension isn’t based on National Insurance contributions. Claimants should also note that the over 80 pension counts as taxable income, so if you’re claiming any other benefits, these could be affected.
You can apply for the scheme by requesting a claim form from your local Jobcentre Plus, or by calling the Pension Service on 0800 731 7898. The earliest you can submit a claim is up to three months before your 80th birthday, or any time after.
