Millions of UK pensioners receive wrong amount ‘for decades’

Millions of UK pensioners receive wrong amount ‘for decades’

Millions of people have received the wrong pension for decades because of government IT failures, the BBC has learned.

The errors, which are understood to have been known about since the 1990s, have not been made public until now.

A former pensions minister described the scale of the problem as “truly mind-blowing”.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) says it is investigating remedies.

Official analysis published last month suggests 23% of pensioners were underpaid, while 17% were overpaid.

Some people have been both overpaid and underpaid in different years, with the vast majority of errors worth one or two pence per week.

In 2002, it was decided by DWP officials that it would be too complicated to fix the problem, and a solution has still not been found.

Source: BBC