Help Ruth secure her state pension

Aim

Ruth's partner died just before they were due to marry and as she has few pension rights she now has to raise funds to pay her contributions

Hi, I'm Ruth. At 66 years old I don't qualify for a state pension. I need your help so that I can live for my remaining years. I cannot claim benefits as I live abroad.

HMRC has declared a 'special offer' to buy back unpaid contributions with a deadline of 31st July this year. I have just enough savings to buy back 5 years, but I need to pay for the remaining 11 years for which I am eligible, each year giving me an extra £5.29 up to a maximum of £111 per week. Even at that rate I would have to live very frugally, but I would manage!

So how did my perilous financial situation come about?

Firstly, a warm welcome to everyone reading this: family, friends and those of you as yet unknown to me. I'm a UK citizen who has lived in Spain for the last 22 years with my partner Sam. I first met Sam on holiday when I was 17. He turned up on my doorstep 'out of the blue' 24 years later and we were together for a further 24 years until his sudden death in May last year while on a visit to the UK. We were due to get married there 3 weeks later!

Sam wanted to live off-grid so in early 2000 he bought a small stone hut in N.E. Spain and we moved in, installed solar panels and later got permission to extend the house. Life was not easy and neither of us considered financial planning for the future, having achieved a level of self-sufficiency away from the mainstream. Sam started having heart-related health problems and after the financial crash of 2008 our savings trickled away. We were used to living on a tight budget and survived until Sam was able to claim his state pension in 2014. By then we were also common-law partners, an alliance officially recognised in Spain but not in the UK.

In 2017 Sam suffered a severe cardiac arrest and our lives were changed forever. It took over 30 minutes for two ambulance crews to resuscitate him so his chances of recovery didn't look promising. He spent a month in the ICU and was finally discharged from hospital after 75 days. Sam's cognitive faculties were impaired to a significant degree and I effectively became his full-time carer. In the following years we lived a life of quiet seclusion and he became happily immersed in vegetable production and reacquainting himself with the alternative power system. Following his death, as well as not being eligible for a widow's pension, it has come as a great shock to me to discover that the legal status of the house is in question so cannot be considered as a saleable asset.

What do I need from you?

As I have been living abroad I have to pay the more costly Class 3 contributions at a rate of £824 for each year. I can just about afford to buy back 5 years out of the 16 for which I am eligible. I have worked hard over the years, particularly in caring for Sam and others, unaware that I could have received Carer's Allowance and other benefits which would have paid my NI contributions.

All I can do now is ask for your support and thank you sincerely for any donation you can make in order to help me to buy back the remaining 11 years by the 31st July deadline. This will be a kindness and generosity on your part for which I will be grateful as long as I live.

        Here are Sam and me on our visit to the UK, a few days before he died

This project successfully funded on 3rd July 2023