British pensioner loses £3k a year in retirement income after DWP 'failing', shocking report finds
An 82-year-old British pensioner living in France lost £3,000 annually from his pension after the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) failed to inform him about crucial payment changes for eight years.Adrian Furnival discovered in 2018 that his Adult Dependency Increase (ADI) payments would be cut from 2020, leaving him more than £250 worse off each month, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) found.According to the ombudsman, the DWP had failed to properly communicate these changes to the 82-year-old, who should have been notified by the Government department in April 2010.This oversight left the former Army serviceman and his wife without adequate time to prepare for the significant reduction in their retirement income. Furnival and his wife Sheila, 67, relocated to Brittany in 1994 after his retirement.The Bedford-born veteran learned about the impending pension cut through a routine annual statement from the DWP in 2018. The statement revealed that his ADI payments - a supplement provided to households where the main earner had reached state pension age but their partner had not - would cease in 2020.Do you have a money story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing money@gbnews.uk.The PHSO is highlighting the case of a British expat who saw their income significantly reduced after not being notified by changes to the DWP policy GETTY The couple, who rely solely on their pensions for income, were left struggling to understand how they would manage the financial shortfall. When Furnival questioned the DWP about the changes, he faced a nine-month wait for a response, prompting him to escalate the matter to his MP and subsequently the ombudsman.While UK residents were informed about the ADI payment changes in 2010, expatriates like Furnival were left in the dark. The PHSO investigation determined that the DWP had failed in its duty to properly communicate these crucial changes to those living abroad.Following the investigation, the Ombudsman recommended that the DWP issue an apology to Furniva and pay him £675 in compensation for the injustice he experienced. The PHSO emphasised the importance of Government bodies ensuring their communication with the public remains fair, clear, and consistent.The DWP's failure to provide timely information denied Furnival the opportunity to make alternative financial arrangements during the eight-year period between 2010 and 2018. Rebecca Hilsenrath, Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, criticised the DWP's track record in communicating pension changes.Britons are worried about their retirement savings GETTY "Poor communication from Government departments damages trust in public services," she said. She highlighted that the DWP "has a history of failing to communicate pension policy changes clearly and failing to learn from its mistakes."Hilsenrath explained that in Furnival's case, this meant he "lost the opportunity to prepare for his retirement" without access to the right information. She urged others who may have experienced similar situations to contact the DWP directly."DWP has complied with our recommendations and will provide a comparable remedy to anyone who approaches them with a similar situation," she added. "It came as a shock to me," said Furnival. "They sent the leaflet to us every year, so they could have told us at any point from 2010 onwards."He expressed deep concern about the sudden reduction in income. "The key issue for me is why I wasn't told that my income would be going down by approximately £70 a week sooner.""We only have our pensions as income, so we were worried about what we were going to do to make ends meet," he added. Furnival emphasised the lost opportunity to prepare for the financial impact."If they had told us at the same time as everyone else, we could have had eight more years to plan for the shortfall." By 2018 we had no way of replacing that income," he explained. "This could have been handled much better."LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:The Waspi women have campaigned for compensation in the wake of DWP "maladministration" GETTYIn May 2019, a year before ADI payments ended, the DWP reported to Parliament that 10,817 people were still receiving these payments. The total number of expatriates affected by similar communication failures remains unknown.The PHSO has recommended that the DWP provide comparable remedies to anyone who comes forward with a similar experience to Furnival's. In December, the DWP accepted the PHSO's finding of maladministration regarding how it communicated state pension age changes to women born in the 1950s.On top of this, the Department committed to learning lessons and working with the Ombudsman to develop an action plan for better future communications.However, the DWP did not fully accept all recommendations and declined to create a compensation scheme for affected women.
